Re: the magazine - Winter 2013

Transcription

FINANCIAL INSTITUTIONS – ENERGY – INFRASTRUCTURE, MINING AND COMMODITIES – TRANSPORT – TECHNOLOGY AND INNOVATION – PHARMACEUTICALS AND LIFE SCIENCES
re:
Environmental issues
Tax
re:
Taking a closer look
Corporate finance
Competition and regulatory
Shipping disputes
International trade and commodities
Mergers and acquisitions
Shipping finance
Marine Insurance
Admiralty
Offshore and energy
Infrastructure
Global shipping excellence
Recognised industry leaders
Legal house of the year
Global Transport Finance 2012
Jane’s Transport Finance 2010, 2011
nortonrose.com/expertise/shipping
A Norton Rose magazine
Issue 4
2900 lawyers / 42 offices / 6 continents
nortonrose.com
Recording, reframing, resisting
Issue 4
Re:
Work
Maestro Nagano
The photo essay: the Middle East
Tales from Russia
Life
Re:
A magazine open to new
perspectives
Issue 4 of Re: was produced
with the aid of the following
individuals within Norton Rose:
Publisher
Laura Shumiloff
Deputy publisher
Susannah Ronn
Magazine editor
Nicola Liu
Art director
Robbie Pattemore
Designers
Michael Dunn
Zeenah Nubheebucus
Picture editor
Ivan Maslarov
Photographers
Damien Butler
Ivan Maslarov
Editorial consultant
Dawn Hayes
Style editor
Madeleine Humphrey
Arts correspondent
Alexandra Howe
Production assistant
Stephanie Hart
Guest writers
Richard Calnan
Sheila Conway
David Cross
Dawn Hayes
Alexandra Howe
Oliver Jamieson
Alevtina Smirnova
Irina Tiverovskaya
Staff writers
Ingeborg Alexander
John Barker, London
Mark Berry, London
Patrick Bracher, Johannesburg
Marie Kelly, Athens
Bayo Odubeko, London
Aiko Okada, Tokyo
Supported by
Wilson Ang, Singapore.
Sonja Baumeister, Munich.
Miriam Beauchamp, Montréal.
Lorraine Berkhoff, Montréal.
Peter Burrows, Moscow. Hye
Sook Cho, Munich. Tina
Costas, Durban. Miriam
Desmarais, Québec. Amanda
Fortuna, Toronto. Val
Govender, London. Philipp
Günther , Munich. Jonathan
Joyce-Hess, Melbourne.
Ken-Hui Khoo, Singapore.
Nadia Koshy, Hong Kong.
Lydia Kungsen, Hong Kong.
Clement Lehembre, London.
Diana McLeish, London. Todd
Melchior, Toronto. Wendy
Quintero, Caracas. Santiago
Ross, Caracas. Clair Simpson,
Sydney. Wylie Spicer, Calgary.
Selene Tan, Singapore. Corrado
Wohlwend, Frankfurt.
and
Claire Berwick, London.
Catherine Copping, Hong Kong.
Izabela Duda, Warsaw. Fumie
Hareyama, Tokyo. Lorraine
Lee, Hong Kong. Steven Leitl,
Calgary. Jenny Leslie, London.
Cornelia Marquardt, Munich.
Pierre Nguyen, Montréal. Jane
Park-Weir, London. Teneille
Rennick, Sydney. Nicole
Sigouin, Toronto. Norman
Steinberg, Montréal. Elžbieta
Swiderska, Warsaw. Lisa
Thomas, Johannesburg. Dawn
Whittaker, Toronto. Rachael
Younger, Dubai. Our To Do and
Coda contributors.
Featuring
Lesley Browning, London
Elisabeth Eljuri, Caracas
and Maria Urtseva, London
External contributors
Liu Bingcheng and Vassilis
Skopelitis (photographers)
Clare Ellis and Caroline
Janssens (illustrators)
Andy Spark (JST)
Sharon Thiruchelvam
Dr Marta Weiss (V&A)
Our thanks to individuals at the V&A
(Alice Evans), the British Museum, the
Art Fund, the JST (Robert Peacock) and
to Frau Christa Pfeffer in Munich.
The poem
‘Fruit’ from Without end:
new and selected poems
by Adam Zagajewski,
translated by several
translators. Copyright ©
2002 Adam Zagajewski.
Translation copyright ©
2002 Farrar, Straus and
Giroux, LLC. Reprinted
by permission of Farrar,
Straus and Giroux, LLC
and reproduced courtesy
of Faber & Faber, London
(Selected Poems 2004).
Contact the Editor
re.magazine@
nortonrose.com
Norton
Rose
Norton Rose is a leading
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practice. With more
than 2900 lawyers, we
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in financial institutions;
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transport; technology
and innovation; and
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On 1 June 2013, Norton
Rose will join forces
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Fulbright & Jaworski L.L.P.
to create Norton Rose
Fulbright. With 3800
lawyers and 54 offices,
including 11 in the US,
Norton Rose Fulbright
will be one of the largest
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of this publication. Any
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the case may be, Norton
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Re:
A magazine for
everyone in Norton
Rose and for our
friends, among
them our clients
and our alumni.
Re: is published
twice a year by
Norton Rose and
is available in
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about us.
© Norton Rose LLP 2013
Issue 4 published January
2013. NR14467.
Printed in the UK
by Pureprint.
£1.00 Not for sale.
Printed on UPM Offset
paper 300 gsm (cover) and
120 gsm (inners).
FSC mark
N o rt o n R o s e S a il t h e W o r l d C h a l l en g e
w i t h t h e J u bi l e e S a il in g T r u st
There are
no limits
to what
we can do,
together
Oc t o b e r 2 0 1 2 – S e p t e m b e r 2 0 1 4
Book your passage at jst.org.uk
Contents
Work
Features
04Contributors
05 The Editor
06 Letters to the Editor
Off stage
07 Richard Calnan
LIGHT
08Close-up
20
10
Obiter dictum
on jurisprudence
The Arctic
The Q&A
Lesley Browning
Maestro
14
The photo essay / Middle East
Once upon a time
The dacha
30
life
36
40
49
35
36
40
The tall ship
The guide
Greece
Nigeria
44Feeling good
46 The kitchen table
Asia
Style
49
52
58
To do
One fine day
Corrado Wohlwend’s Top Five
54 The poem
55Real science
56 One hundred words
58 The person
Elisabeth Eljuri
62
Back streets
Melbourne
64Coda
contributors
Ingeborg
Alexander
The Q&A
Off stage
The person
Wilson Ang
The kitchen table
John Barker
The poem
Sonja
Baumeister
Feeling good
Lorraine
Berkhoff
Feeling good
Mark Berry
Real science
Caroline
Janssens
100 words
Liu Bingcheng
The kitchen table
Patrick Bracher
Obiter dictum
Damien Butler
Back streets
Richard Calnan
On jurisprudence
Sheila Conway
The photo essay
Tina Costas
Feeling good
Vassilis
Skopelitis
The guide
Sharon
Thiruchelvam
Style
David Cross
100 words
Amanda Fortuna
Feeling good
Val Govender
Feeling good
Dawn Hayes
100 words
Alexandra Howe
100 words
Madeleine
Humphrey
Style
Oliver Jamieson
The photo essay
Jonathan
Joyce-Hess
Feeling good
Marie Kelly
The guide
Ken-Hui Khoo
The kitchen table
Clement
Lehembre
Feeling good
Diana McLeish
Feeling good
Bayo Odubeko
The guide
Aiko Okada
The kitchen table
Wendy Quintero
Feeling good
Santiago Ross
Feeling good
Alevtina
Smirnova
Once upon a time
Selene Tan
The kitchen table
Irina
Tiverovskaya
Once upon a time
Corrado
Wohlwend
Feeling good,
One fine day
04
Dr Marta Weiss
Light from the
Middle East
:The Editor
T
his is the fourth issue of Re:, a magazine for everyone in
Norton Rose around the world and for our friends, among
them our clients and our alumni. In this issue, I invite you
to use your imagination. A tall ship sails the high seas;
contemporary photographers working in the Middle East
present their wares; and Maestro Kent Nagano conducts a
personal tour of the high art of music. Finally, we have some
short stories. Very short. One hundred words, to be exact.
I invite you to take a look (page 56) and then send me your
own story, in 100 words, for possible publication.
The next issue will appear in the summer. See you then.
The Editor
05
re: Work
Letters to
the Editor
Obiter dictum
I attach my attempt at the
100-word story. I have to
admit it took a lot of effort,
but it was fun. Hope I have
made the deadline, and the
grade.
David Cross, Sydney
You can read David’s story on
page 56 and form your own
view as to whether he made
the grade. Ed.
ex contractu
Thanks to Norman Steinberg
for sharing his thoughts
and experience on time
management. My assistant
and I now start every day
with a short planning
meeting.
Felicia Kohn, Milan
Your article on dementia
was outstanding! Something
so omnipresent and still so
many have no clue how to
deal with it in a grown-up
manner.
Andreas Börner, Munich
I just read your article about
dementia in Re: magazine.
It is beautifully written
– thoughtful, wise and
empathetic. I’m sure it will
touch everyone who reads it
in some way.
Ruth Wahl, Toronto
Contact the Editor
Do you have ideas for
future issues? Do you
want to get involved? I am
looking among Norton Rose
for researchers, writers,
editors, photographers and
illustrators.
Just read Re: over my
morning coffee. Brought
tears to my eyes and made
me smile. Lovely way to
start the day, remember old
friends and learn new things.
Cindy Godwin, AlixPartners
A quick word to congratulate
you on the quality of Re:.
I am an avid reader of
magazines and the look and
feel of Re: is up there with
the best of them.
Pierre Nguyen, Montréal
I found the dementia article
very powerful and well
written and really touching.
My nan is currently suffering
the mid to late stages. It is a
powerful learning curve for
me to find out what works
best for her; no meeting with
her is ever the same.
Mark Horton, London
A quick word of appreciation
for the latest edition. I
particularly liked the
compilation on dementia
– informative, sensitive
and uncommonly useful
to anyone contemplating
the later years of their
life or understanding the
difficulties of the declining
powers of others amongst
relatives or friends.
David Alexander, Alumni
I have just received the latest
issue of Re:, which I think
is wonderful and hugely
interesting.
Linda Ashworth, Alumni
Latin, deconstructed, in case of need
Arising from contract. It is usually a judicial
policy decision whether someone who breaches
a contract can also be sued in tort (delict) for
any harm done.
ex gratia
As an act of grace or as a favour. If you pay a claim
ex gratia your goodness may not be rewarded:
without a legal liability to pay, you may not be
able to recover your outlay from a third party.
ex officio
By virtue of the office or status held, to be given
some particular position or privilege. Thus, ‘the
MD is ex officio chair of the board’.
ex parte
In relation to a court application, by one party
only without notice to any other party. It is
sometimes used to describe the parties to a case
where one represents the interests of another.
For example, R v Committee of Lloyd’s, ex parte
Posgate 1983. It is not a hangover.
ex tempore
On the spur of the moment.
ex turpi causa non oritur actio
A claim will not be countenanced by a court if
the party bringing the claim is guilty of moral
turpitude or illegal conduct. You have to come to
court with clean hands.
ex nihilo nihil fit
The ancient Roman version of the song ‘Nothing
comes from nothing’.
ex silentio
[email protected]
A conclusion drawn from the fact that nothing
was said or written. Rather like the undisguised
elephant in the room.
The Editor, Re:, Norton Rose
3 More London Riverside
London SE1 2AQ, UK
Patrick Bracher is a senior lawyer with Norton
Rose in Johannesburg.
06
:Richard Calnan
Richard Calnan
on jurisprudence
H
ow do judges decide cases? In 1921, Benjamin Cardozo gave a series of lectures
at Yale University in which he attempted to answer that question. The lectures
were subsequently published under the title The nature of the judicial process.
Justice Cardozo was one of the most
distinguished judges of the twentieth
century. He became a Justice of the United
States Supreme Court but is best known
for his work as a member of the New York
Court of Appeals. His judgments during
the early years of the twentieth century
re-examined basic common law principles
in the light of the rapid industrialisation
of the US at the time. Cardozo was
one of that rare breed of judges whose
judgments are worth reading as much
for the elegance of their style as for the
incisiveness of their legal analysis.
The need for a discussion of the
nature of the judicial process is
apparent from Cardozo’s early years as
a judge: “I was much troubled in spirit,
in my first years upon the bench, to find
how trackless was the ocean on which I
had embarked. I sought for certainty. I
was oppressed and disheartened when
I found that the quest for it was futile. I
was trying to reach land, the solid land
of fixed and settled rules…”
So how do judges make their
decisions? In most cases, the law is
clear, and what is in dispute is the facts.
In many cases there is a clear precedent.
But what if there is not? Then the judge
must fashion the law for the litigants
before him and, in doing so, he will also
be fashioning it for others. His judgment
itself is then the source from which new
principles may spring.
One of the peculiarities of the common
law system is that it does not start with
universal truths and derive conclusions
from them. It draws its generalisations
from particulars. “The sordid
controversies of litigants”, said Cardozo,
“are the stuff out of which great and
shining truths will ultimately be shaped.
The accidental and the transitory will
yield the essential and the permanent.”
If the judge has the power to create
law in this way, how does he – or, now,
she – get it right? As Cardozo said, before
we can determine the proportions of a
blend, we must know the ingredients to
be blended. He thought there were four:
logic, history, custom and social needs.
Any legal system needs to be
internally consistent in order to avoid
uncertainty and partiality. And it needs
to be seen in the light of its history and
development, and in the context of
custom and of prevailing moral attitudes.
The difficult question is the extent
to which logic must be tempered by
a recognition of the wider interests
of society. Cardozo was influenced
by the American Realist school of
jurisprudence, which saw the common
law as essentially the philosophy of
pragmatism. It was best expressed by
another great American jurist – Oliver
Wendell Holmes – when he said that “the
life of the law has not been logic; it has
been experience”.
Cardozo’s view was that when social
needs demand one result rather than
another, there are times when we must
bend symmetry and ignore history in
the pursuit of other and larger ends.
That is not to say that there are no rules,
and that judges can make it up as they
go along. Certainty and predictability
require most cases to be decided in
accordance with pre-existing rules. But
sometimes the needs of society should
prevail. Cardozo believed the truth to be
that there are few rules; there are chiefly
standards and degrees.
This discussion goes to the heart of
the way in which judges develop the law.
Logic, on its own, may produce a result
that is unfair. How is that dichotomy to
be resolved? Answers on a postcard.
Next time: Lord Denning
Richard Calnan is a partner with Norton Rose in London
and Visiting Professor at UCL (University College London).
07
stats
18m 4m
24 3m
square miles
inhabitants
500,000
Smallest
time zones
caribou migrate 2,000
miles each year
world’s smallest and shallowest ocean
gigatons of carbon locked
in northern permafrost
the planet’s land mass the Taiga forest is 1/3
of all trees on earth
indigenous people
1,650 1/6 1/3
the AR
Research by Todd Melchior
and Alexandra Howe
Close-up
work
eat
Mining
Bearded seal
blood
Walrus
Sun-dried fish
Kiviaq
iron, gold, diamonds,
copper, coal
Oil
Fur trapping
arctic foxes, squirrels
Reindeer herding
fermented auks caught
in nets, stuffed into a
seal skin and buried
until winter, tastes of
gorgonzola
Shellfish
Pizza
walruses, seals
cod, haddock, Pollack
Forestry
Tourism
08
Chum
reindeer hides sewn
together and wrapped
around wooden poles
Igloo
built of snow by the Inuit
Balok
built on sled runners
Hunting
Fishing
shelter
Narwhal
rich in vitamin C
Kentucky Fried
Chicken
Iurta
wooden frame covered with
felt made from sheep wool
INDIGENOUS
peoples
40+
including
Aleut
Chukchi
Dolgans
Evenk
Inuit
Khanty
Koyukon
Nenets
Nganasans
Saami
Yupik
Yukagirs
THE AR
CTIC
CIR
CLE
–
Pack and drift ice,
rugged shorelines,
polar desert, tundra
(land of no trees),
forest, ocean
ARCTIC SEA ICE
OF
66
H
RT
NO
3'
°3
terrain
NO
RT
H
E
UD
TIT
LA
T HE
AR
CR
P
RE THE AVERAGE TEM
– WHE
IN
E
N
EGIO
-30 °C
summer
0 °C
CT I
winter
EE
TR
L
ARCTIC
ER
ATU
R
ice
Winter
2–3m thick at
North Pole
Melting
Ice shrinking by
2.7% per decade
Summer
Ice-free
summers
by 2020?
sun
Rises in March
Sets in October
land of the midnight sun
aurora borealis
-1
OW
BEL
INS
E FOR JULY REMA
0 ºC
Arctic Council
Derivation
promotes
From the Greek
word for bear,
arktos
cooperation, coordination,
interaction among Arctic States
Member States
Canada
Denmark (Incl. Greenland and Faroe Islands)
Finland
Iceland
Norway
Russian Federation
Sweden
USA
polar bear
representing indigenous peoples
endangered
non-Arctic states and organisations
Polar bear/Ringed seal/
Peary caribou/Arctic
fox/Beluga whale/
Arctic wolf/Narwhal
Permanent Participants
Observers
Issues
Climate change
Sustainable development
Protection of environment
Scientific research
Ursus maritimus, Sea bear, Umky, Nanuk,
Isbjorn, ice bear, Beliy medved, white
bear, Pihoqahiak, the ever-wandering
one, Lord of the Arctic, Old man in the
fur cloak, white sea deer
09
re: Work
The Q&A
Lesley Browning
‘an I n f l u e n t i al W o ma n’
What advice would you give to
someone setting out in their career
in law?
I would advise them to be sure that
it actually is what they want to do. I
don’t think it’s an easy career option
and I think to succeed you do have to
work quite hard. It’s not a career for
the faint-hearted.
I would also advise them to be
focused when they’re a trainee and
to take it all seriously. These days,
it’s much harder to get a training
contract. They’ve all got fantastic
results, they’re all predicted a 2:1
or equivalent, they’ve all done lots
of good work for charity. They’re up
against some stiff competition.
When you do qualify, choose
something you’re going to enjoy and
that you can see yourself doing in
20 years. We’re very specialised in
the UK. You don’t see somebody do
banking law for four years and then
suddenly think, actually I’d prefer to
be a litigator. It just doesn’t happen.
Part of what influenced me to choose
pensions was that I enjoyed trust law
at university; my tutor was Dr Jim
Harris, who was the trust law man
of the time, and he was incredibly
inspiring.
I sometimes think that more junior
people find it harder to build
relationships because they’re so
reluctant to pick up the telephone,
and they do everything by email, and
I seriously don’t think that you build
any sort of relationship with someone
by sending them an email. I’ve some
clients who would say, “I’ve been sent
ten emails by this person, what are
they going on about? I don’t know
10
what they want.” Whereas if you pick
up the phone, it’s quite plain what
you want.
How do you combine being a partner
in an international law firm and being
a parent with small children?
It is quite difficult, and you have to
be very organised. I’m lucky: my
husband isn’t working full time at
the moment, so although we’re both
involved in getting the children out
the door, he is responsible for pickups, and so I don’t have the difficulty
of having to leave work at a given
time. I think for all working families
who have children, that’s hard. If
my husband were not working part
time, I guess we’d have to have some
outside help.
I’ve really benefited from the changes
in technology that enable you to log
in from home; it’s easier to go home,
see your children and do some work
later on. A lot of people do that now.
It’s a lot tougher on our corporate
and banking partners; in the weeks
coming up to closing, they’re working
until midnight every night, and they
have to be here because the clients
are up on the ninth floor.
What hope is there on the pensions
front for people in the UK?
There is real potential in the UK for
significant social problems because of
people’s lack of pensions saving.
What hope is there? I think people
have to accept that if they want to
be comfortable in retirement they
have to consider saving more. They
shouldn’t just rely on having property
to see them through to retirement or
rely on the State giving them enough
money to maintain their standard of
living. Pensions is such a complicated
subject, it’s difficult to communicate
to people as to why they ought to be
saving.
Auto-enrolment should bring
more people into pension saving
and perhaps help educate people.
People in the UK are not as a whole
financially savvy. They tend to shy
away from financial issues. There
is a culture of “What’s the point?”
or “I might not live long enough to
enjoy it”, “I don’t know anything
about investment”, “I don’t know
who to talk to about this”. By the time
people start thinking about saving
for retirement, they’ve sort of left it
too late. A huge proportion of people
aged 45 in the UK have little or no
retirement savings. You’re leaving
yourself 20 years to save for your
retirement rather than starting when
you’re 25 and having 40 years.
Where they’re able to, people should
diversify. Spread the risk. Then you
can have different pots of money
doing different things over different
periods, with different levels of risk;
but I suppose that’s in an ideal world
where someone has enough money to
actually be able to do that.
In the UK, too many people think that
their entire economic future is bound
up in their property. They’ve got no
safety net.
What pension provision have you
arranged for yourself?
I have a personal pension
arrangement, which I contribute to
quarterly, and I always have done. It’s
a really good arrangement that has
loads of different funds you can invest
in. I have an independent financial
adviser who I think is really good
and who I trust and so I work with
her on choosing what I’m going to
invest in, and I switch the funds
around occasionally if they’re not
performing well.
How hard was it 20 years ago to
make a career as a woman in the
legal sector?
It’s still quite hard now, actually, for
women in the law. We have a real
issue with a lot of women choosing
to leave the profession before they
become partners. We have this pool
of really talented women who, to
be honest, probably would have
outshone their male peer group at
university, at law school, during their
training contracts and indeed in their
junior years. We need to try harder to
keep those people.
Do you ever get tired of people
pointing out that you are a woman in
the same breath as they are pointing
out your achievements?
I do find that a bit irritating, because
that’s irrelevant, actually, in a lot of
ways.
I understand that you support
Arsenal Football Club.
I do! I have supported Arsenal for
years and my husband has since he
was a little boy; our children say they
support Arsenal but I’m not sure they
really know what that means.
Is it true that you like rock music?
I guess you’d call it indie rock and
roll. The Smiths, REM, the Cure, all
very eighties. My husband and I go to
see live music quite a lot. I like other
types of music as well. Frank Sinatra,
music of that era. And I love the Arctic
Monkeys. I’ve seen them at Wembley.
Quite often, my husband and I look
around and think that we are in the
older age category, but that’s just life.
Lesley Browning joined Norton Rose as head of
pensions (based in London) in 2001. She read law
at Keble College, Oxford and has twice featured in
the Financial News 100 Most Influential Women
in Finance.
Interview by Ingeborg Alexander
Photograph by Ivan Maslarov
11
Fast forward
to the usa
Norton Rose and Fulbright & Jaworski L.L.P.
are joining forces as Norton Rose Fulbright
On June 3 2013, Norton Rose and Fulbright & Jaworski L.L.P.
will become Norton Rose Fulbright – a global legal practice
with significant depth of expertise in the world’s principal
business and financial centres. Our momentum will deliver
the US capability and services our clients need for fast
forward growth wherever they are in the world.
Norton Rose Fulbright – Law around the world
nortonrose.com/nortonrosefulbright
Off stage
Ingeborg Alexander meets
Maestro Kent Nagano
© Felix Broede
:Off stage
I
travelled to Munich in southern Germany to observe
Maestro Kent Nagano conduct Wagner’s Tannhäuser
at the Bavarian State Opera House before interviewing
him the following day, for Re:. On the grey, rainy streets
outside, the Oktoberfest was swirling around, the
dirndls and the lederhosen were out in abundance, and
it was hard to get a seat in the Bavarian coffee house
where I went to review my notes. The general noise and
anonymity suited my purpose perfectly.
The manners of the Old World still prevail here, giving
discourse a particular weight and courtesy. Kent Nagano
is Californian but his early influences were a mix of
Japanese (from his grandparents) and European. Born
in 1951, he grew up in rural California, near the ocean.
His teachers included great musicians who had fled
the chaos of Europe, and among his neighbours were
farmers, doctors and teachers from across central and
southern Europe. Nagano, from what I could see, had an
extraordinary childhood: Old World courtesies, music
entirely and absolutely everywhere, the whole world
explored and understood through culture.
Now, Kent Nagano is Music Director at the Bavarian
State Opera House and Music Director of the Orchestre
Symphonique de Montréal – hence the Norton Rose
connection: Norton Rose’s Global Chairman, Norman
Steinberg, is a vice chair of the executive committee of
the Montréal Symphony and played an instrumental
role in the contractual negotiations during Nagano’s
appointment, in 2006.
Sitting next to me at the performance of Tannhäuser
was the planning director from Sweden’s Gothenburg
Symphony Orchestra. In 2013, Nagano takes on the
role of Artistic Advisor and Principal Guest Conductor of
the Gothenburg Symphony, following on from Gustavo
Dudamel. He continues at Montréal but leaves Munich
and, in 2015, becomes General Music Director at the
Staatsoper Hamburg and Principal Conductor with the
Hamburg Philharmonic.
Nagano’s life spans the globe. His wife, Mari Kodama
– also there at the Tannhäuser – is Japanese and an
international concert pianist, and they have a teenage
daughter. They have homes in Paris and San Francisco
and live out of hotels elsewhere, but “Home”, Nagano
told me, “is where the family is.” “We have our famous
Ten Day Rule: the family cannot be separated for more
than ten days, and we maintain that pretty stringently.”
It can’t be easy. Kent Nagano’s career has taken him
everywhere. He has long-standing associations with
the Berkeley Symphony Orchestra. He has worked
with the Vienna, Berlin and New York Philharmonics,
the Chicago Symphony, the Dresden Staatskapelle and
Leipzig Gewandhaus and the Manchester Hallé, and in
2003 became the first music director at the Los Angeles
Opera. In 2006, the Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester in
Berlin gave him the rare accolade of honorary conductor.
He has toured in Europe, Japan and Korea (but not, it
seems, in China). He has conducted performances of
Beethoven, Wagner, Mahler, Puccini – but also of his
mentor Messiaen, John Adams, Jörg Widmann, Unsuk
Chin and Frank Zappa. In Montréal, where he has done
so much my ink will run dry before I can get it all down
on paper, he collaborated with the writer Yann Martel
on a piece about Prometheus and performed Stravinsky
in Nunavik in the Arctic region. Google him, and you
will see the full breadth of his repertoire.
When he was a university student in San Francisco –
and he is 61 now – Kent Nagano studied sociology and
composition. It was the Hungarian cellist Laszlo Varga
who later steered him toward conducting.
In Munich, as I observed the Maestro at work, I saw
why he has been described as a conductor of great
clarity, elegance and intelligence. It was like watching a
choreographer, as he leaned forward – poised much as
a dancer stretches their body, their arm, wrist, fingers –
delineating the shape of the music that flowed out of his
baton and through the opera house.
Our conversation the next day concentrated on music.
I found Kent Nagano very courteous, quite formal and
clearly a man given to much thought and reflection. We
had an hour and a half in which to talk; that was already
generous – but not enough, not enough at all, when I
glanced over my list of 52 questions. Had I perhaps overprepared?
My last question to the Maestro was, what did he
think of silence? “Let’s define for a moment that silence
means an absence of acoustical stimulus. That doesn’t
mean that there’s no mental stimulus taking place. That
doesn’t mean that there’s no imagination or creativity
taking place. Silence is one of the most active parts of
creativity.”
Let the rest, then, be silence.
With particular thanks to Christa Pfeffer.
15
re: Feature
preparation is the phase
that allows you to have
freedom at the moment of
performance
Maestro Nagano takes centre stage
We, as people, and as a community – and an orchestra is a community,
it is a micro society – we are all different. It’s something to rejoice in.
Ensembles, too, sound strikingly different; each of the great orchestras
has its own identity, its own character and tradition of making music, its
own mores.
Opera is, from the traditional point of view, the foundation of modern
conducting technique. The opera repertoire first appeared as a
development growing out of the tradition of the French overture, usually
tied to ballet. The overture was an instrumental statement before the
actual spectacle. It gave rise to ever more developed forms, eventually
becoming the forms that we recognise as the high forms of the eighteenth
and nineteenth centuries.
In the mid-nineteenth century, working within the theatre meant
fundamental challenges, not only for the conductor, but also for the very
large orchestra, sizable chorus and cast, who had extraordinary vocal
demands placed upon them. Keeping all the musicians coordinated has
always fallen on the shoulders of the conductor. Today, it involves not just
an understood level of technique, but also an understanding of literature,
of the repertoire, of the history of the house, and the history of the music
upon which the interpretation is based. This interpretation involves other
people’s interpretations as well, because a certain flexibility, a certain
inclusiveness, needs to take place.
Interpretation also deals with the realities of acoustics and physics; in a
large orchestra, the left part of the orchestra can’t always hear the right
part very well and the people in the middle are sometimes required
to make split-second adjustments between the dominant parts of the
ensemble and its secondary parts. In addition, the distances – between
16
© Felix Broede
:Off stage
offstage choruses or soloists singing metres away –
require a technique based on a ‘visualisation’ of the
music which allows you to communicate the intended
interpretation of the music before it actually happens.
If you simply do it at the time it’s happening, of course
the response of the ensemble will be late. So, if you are
showing what the musical intention is, this intention
needs to come just a moment before or be prepared
in such a way that, at the time of actual performance
or production of the sound, it comes together in ‘real
time’. These are the requirements of any orchestra and
of any conductor and any cast who work within a very
large form.
This function of the conductor has evolved from what
was originally considered the conductor’s primary role:
to keep a basic pulse so that a large group of people
could stay together.
The art form of operatic spectacle developed hugely
in terms of its required forces and musical language.
In opera music, we have a text sung by the soloists
and the chorus. We also have the fundamental text in
the form of written notation, rhythm and pitch. Even
with the benefit of beautiful sonorous melodies, the
melody alone cannot provide the full dimensions of
an operatic experience. It involves much more than
simply entertainment or a nice tune. The experience
includes drama. It’s theatre. It’s philosophy. It’s
spirituality. It’s also the very real ‘physical’ impact of
experiencing the opera performance.
Preparation is the phase that allows you to have
freedom at the moment of performance. We say that a
performance is not really a creative moment but rather
a re-creative moment. The only part of music that is
truly creative lies in the hands of the composer. During
any given evening, we recreate that creation. Creative
spontaneity and flexibility need to be involved in our
performance. Overpreparation would be the limiting
of that spontaneity of expression – saying that you
are only allowed to do this or this or this, which is
not what preparation is. For me, preparation involves
a thorough exercising of the literature so that one
understands the content of the music in depth, not
only how its structure works but actually what we are
going to try to say through this. Then comes the step of
forgetting all of that, letting it go: and performing the
piece as if it had never been performed before.
The mystery about music is that there is no one way
to perform it. We live in a time when we are, all of us,
myself included, at risk of thinking that everything can
be fully defined, and that we can somehow – through
technology, knowledge or skills – come to a full
understanding of what’s actually taking place: we can
explain anything. One of the wonderful and terrible
things about the arts, and specifically about music,
is that whether or not we feel we understand it – we
17
re: Feature
don’t. Each time I return to Wagner, Beethoven or any of the other great
titans of our literature, there are no real answers. There are only questions.
Every artist brings his or her perspective to the art form. For me, it is
important to allow the composer’s intentions to come through. I’ve
studied composition myself and I’ve worked with many living composers.
I understand how terribly fragile it is to be a composer – it’s often a pretty
hostile world out there for a new piece of music, particularly today.
Of all the composers whom I’ve ever known, the consistent objective has
been content, conveyed from within the notes and rhythms. A conductor
can help open doorways into what the meaning of the music could have
been – from the sense of the composer. I say ‘could have been’ because
sometimes composers can’t really put into words exactly what it is they’re
meaning to express – sometimes yes, but not always. In these cases, and I
remember this as a music student, simply having an image is very helpful.
opera is the foundation
of modern conducting
technique
You can spend a long time trying to explain the colour blue but just seeing
the colour blue gives an instant and very clear impression. To take a
rudimentary example: in a musical score, we find dynamics such as forte
or piano. Now, what does piano mean? From the Italian and Latin sources,
it means softer or in the case of forte, stronger, but everything is relative.
In the case of Wagner’s Tannhäuser, there are times when piano means
‘coming from a distance’. So, simply giving the image to a player that, in
this case, piano suggests ‘coming from a distance’ helps to produce the
right kind of sound, colours and resonance.
When I was six years old, I had an art teacher who played a piece of music
and told the class: paint anything that comes to your mind. What actually
came into my imagination was a wonderful contour of ice cream, with
the beautiful curves and the wonderful flavours; and so I painted dishes
and dishes of ice cream. In fact the piece was Debussy’s La Mer – The Sea.
My art teacher was definitely disappointed; that was not what she had
in mind. But that is music! La Mer by Claude Debussy is not exclusively
about the sea. The titles came afterwards, like many of these pieces.
Maintaining a constant contact with nature is a very high priority to me;
it remains a source of inspiration for all art forms. It is so easy to lose
contact with aspects of nature in our air-conditioned elevator-installed
buildings. To walk up a few flights of stairs every once in a while reminds
us of how strong the pull of gravity is. If you forget this, at least in music,
you don’t have a feel any more for the pull of gravity or tonality or the
pull of the musical accent. That feeling of stealing time away and giving it
back, what we call rubato, is based upon gravity.
I grew up in a rural part of California. My grandparents immigrated as
teenagers at the end of the 1800s. They brought with them incredible
gifts of Japanese culture, literature and cuisine. They spoke to the
grandchildren in Japanese; I’ve forgotten most of it now, but I feel a
mysterious familiarity when I go back to Japan. It’s more than nostalgia.
It’s a sense of distance – a distance which I observe when speaking with
18
:Off stage
people. It’s the rhythm of speech. It’s sometimes the way of looking at the
world around us. The most striking awareness came when I married my
wife, who is of ‘true’ Japanese descent. I then began to learn more about
my own heritage.
The United States is, and probably always will be, a country where
immigration is an integral part of its history. In California, we had Italian
Swiss, Portuguese, French and German neighbours – first- and secondgeneration families. Their languages were preserved and spoken.
Christmas was wonderful. We would go visit neighbouring farms and
houses and would be treated to a German Tannenbaum, to Swiss Italian
Christmas folk songs or to wonderful French Provençal costumes. On
New Year’s, which for the Japanese is very important, we would invite our
neighbours to the ranch and dress in kimonos. This was colourful and
was normal for us. It’s sometimes hard for non-Americans to understand
that that mix of cultures was not extraordinary; that was ordinary.
Most of my teachers were European trained musicians, escaping the
Second World War. The orchestras that I heard growing up were rich with
great players, who came from Europe. It was a bifurcation with the sunny
beach mentality and the ever rising power of Hollywood and marketing
and consumerism that was really taking flight in those days. I didn’t think
about it at the time. I was one of many students; we were all being taught
and formed the same way.
As a young adult, I was keenly interested in sociology. The expansion of
the Vietnam War into Cambodia, the Watergate scandal, the impeachment
of our president Richard Nixon – these were traumatic times. It seemed
to me that the world was going to become ever smaller and conflicts more
frequent, more intense. My feeling was that it would be very interesting
to be involved in international politics somehow – either with the United
Nations as a diplomat or within the field of international law. I did attend
law school long enough, at least, to learn some fundamentals of legal
thinking. I’m still fascinated by politics and by law in general. But, by the
1980s, I firmly felt that music was, at least for me, a much stronger way to
communicate, instead of through mastering a legal language. Ultimately,
the arts play, in an indirect way, ambassadorial functions.
The Staatsoper Hamburg, the Orchestre Symphonique de Montréal and
the Gothenburg Symphony Orchestra are three very separate institutions,
representing three very different cultural traditions, each one important
and historically prestigious in its own way. The one thing that all three
have in common is that they share a fundamental value system that
I share. Plus, all three are really ambitious at the moment, with great
dreams and great energy going forward.
There are aspects of research that I’ve always wanted to do, like pursuing
academic work – I seriously considered going back to school and writing a
dissertation on the history of consciousness – but for now I will push these
plans back a few years. There is still a lot more artistic work to be done. ■
that feeling of stealing
time away and giving it
back, what we call rubato,
is based upon gravity
19
re: Photo essay
Light
from
the Middle
East
the past in order to make statements
about the present. In her series
Qajar (1998), Shadi Ghadirian
restages studio portraits made
in Iran during the Qajar period
(1786–1925), using contemporary
props. The Moroccan photographer
Hassan Hajjaj reframes Western
fashion photography, underscoring
the photograph’s status as an object
by introducing other media, such as
the recycled tyre framing Saida in
Green (2006).
Resisting
Some
photographers
resist
the apparent authority of the
photograph, underscoring ways
he exhibition from which these in which images are subject to
photographs are taken reveals manipulation. In Wonder Beirut,
how contemporary Middle Eastern Joana Hadjithomas and Khalil
artists are investigating the language Joreige present prints from damaged
and techniques of photography. The negatives, referencing a fictional
scope of this project is geographic, photographer who, at the onset of
spanning North Africa to Central civil war in Lebanon in 1975, burned
Asia. The emphasis is on the medium his 1968 Tourist Board photographs.
of photography and the works are Atiq Rahimi used a primitive box
organised in three sections.
camera in Kabul in Afghanistan in
Recording
2002, employing a technique that
Photography is a means of recording gives unpredictable but evocative
people, places and events. Issa results and printing the grainy
Touma’s wide-angle photographs images on small, intimate scraps of
convey a sense of immersion in an textured paper. Nermine Hammam
annual Sufi procession in northern uses digital alteration in her series
Syria. In her video Shadow Sites II, Upekkha (2011) to remove Egyptian
Jananne Al-Ani screens massive soldiers from the chaos of Cairo and
aerial views of the desert, revealing into picture-perfect settings.
that it is inhabited – and not, as Marta Weiss
myth would have it, empty space. Curator of photographs
Abdulnasser Gharem’s photograph Victoria and Albert Museum
Siraat (2007) shows a single word
repeatedly spray-painted onto a
partially collapsed bridge, which fell The exhibition Light from the Middle East: New
Photography is drawn from the Art Fund Collection
down in the 1980s while villagers of Middle Eastern Photography at the V&A and the
were seeking shelter from a flash British Museum. It runs at the V&A until 7 April 2013.
accompanying book, Light from the Middle East:
flood. Siraat means ‘the path’ (and The
New Photography (by Marta Weiss, with an essay by
in the Quran, ‘the path to God’).
Venetia Porter and contributions by Kate Best and
Stephen Deuchar), from which the (revised) extract
Reframing
printed above is taken, along with biographical
Many Middle Eastern artists material and artists’ quotations, was co-published
appropriate or imitate images from in 2012 by V&A Publishing and Steidl.
T
20
:Light from the Middle East
21
re: Photo essay
Previous page
Above
Issa Touma
Born Syria (Safita), 1962. Lives and works in Aleppo. A prominent
figure in the Syrian art scene and self-taught photographer.
Founder of Le Pont Organisation and Gallery. Art director of the first
European-Arab jazz festival in Aleppo. His photographs reflect life
in Syria, particularly Aleppo.
Jananne Al-Ani
Born Iraq (Kirkuk), 1966. Lives and works in London. Studied at the
Byam Shaw School of Art. Graduated with an MA in photography,
Royal College of Art, 1997. Senior Research Fellow, University of
the Arts, London. Works with photography, film and video. She has
exhibited widely, including Sydney, Tokyo and New York. Winner of
the Abraaj Capital Art Prize, 2011.
“I like to work quietly and to understand my subject well. So my
work takes time.”
Gelatin silver print, from the series Sufis: the day of al-Ziyara, 1995–2005,
30 x 40 cm. © V&A. Art Fund Collection of Middle Eastern Photography at the
V&A and the British Museum.
22
“Only when the sun is at its lowest do the features on the ground,
the archaeological sites and settlements [the ‘shadow sites’],
come to light.”
Shadow Sites II, 2011, single channel digital video, duration 8 min 38 sec,
photography Adrian Warren, commissioned by Abraaj Capital Art Prize,
courtesy the artist and Rose Issa Projects, London. © V&A. Art Fund Collection
of Middle Eastern Photography at the V&A and the British Museum.
Above
Abdulnasser Gharem
Born Saudi Arabia (Khamis Mushait), 1973. Lives and works in
Riyadh. Works across a variety of media. Co-founder in 2008 of
Edge of Arabia, an initiative to promote contemporary Saudi art.
He combines service in the Saudi armed forces (he is currently
Lieutenant Colonel) with his activities as an artist.
“Siraat is one of my favourite works. The right path is something
people all over the world are looking for… it connects people of
every faith and ideology.”
Siraat [The path], 2009, inkjet print on aluminium, 70 x 120 cm.
© BM. Art Fund Collection of Middle Eastern Photography at the V&A and the
British Museum.
23
re: Photo essay
Shadi Ghadirian
Born Iran (Tehran), 1974. Lives and works in Tehran. Graduated
in photography from Azad University, Tehran. Her work addresses
concerns of Iranian women of her generation.
Gelatin silver bromide prints, from the series Qajar 1998, 30 x 24 cm.
© V&A. Art Fund Collection of Middle Eastern Photography at the V&A and the
British Museum.
24
Hassan Hajjaj
Born Morocco (Larache), 1961. Lives and works in London and Marrakesh. Lived in London from the
age of 14, returned to Morocco in 1992. Short-listed for the 2009 V&A Jameel Prize. Won the Sovereign
African Art prize in 2011. He is a designer of fashion, furniture and interiors, and a photographer.
“I want to push photography into ‘mixed media’ as a challenge to the art world.”
Saida in Green, 2000, digital C-print and tyre frame, 65 x 55 cm. © V&A. Art Fund Collection of Middle Eastern
Photography at the V&A and the British Museum.
25
re: Photo essay
Joana Hadjithomas and Khalil Joreige
Born Lebanon (Beirut), 1969. Live and work in Beirut and Paris. Collaborate as filmmakers and artists on award-winning films as
well as photographic and video installations. Solo exhibitions in Paris, Montréal, Houston, San Francisco and Oxford. They teach at St Joseph
University, Beirut (and elsewhere) and work with Metropolis Cinema in Lebanon. Winners of the Abraaj Capital Art Prize, 2012.
“We enjoy escaping definitions and categories to invent and invade new territories.”
C-prints mounted on aluminium with face mounting, from the series Wonder Beirut: the story of a pyromaniac 1997–2006. Courtesy of the artists and CRG
Gallery, New York and In Situ / Fabienne Leclerc, Paris, © V&A. Art Fund Collection of Middle Eastern Photography at the V&A and the British Museum. Wonder
Beirut 13, Modern Beirut, International Centre of Water-Skiing; and Wonder Beirut 14, The Statue of Riad Solh, 70.5 x 105.4 cm.
26
Atiq Rahimi
Born Afghanistan (Kabul), 1962. Lives and works in Paris, France. Moved to Pakistan and then France in 1984. Graduated from the Université
Paris-Sorbonne with a doctorate in audio-visual communication. Poet and author of novels set in Afghanistan. He returned to Kabul in 2002 and
is working with Afghan writers and film-makers.
“Early photography overwhelms me. It transports me beyond time.”
Gelatin silver prints, from the series Le retour imaginaire, 2002 © V&A. Art Fund Collection of Middle Eastern Photography at the V&A and the British Museum. Culde-sac des souvenirs [Dead end of memories], irregular paper, approx 9 x 14 cm. L’éveil des deux frères sur l’arbre endormi [The awakening of the two brothers on
the sleeping tree], irregular paper, approx 9 x 14 cm. Là où résonne la voix de Dieu [Where the voice of God resonates], irregular paper, approx 9 x 14 cm
27
re: Photo essay
Nermine Hammam
Born Egypt (Cairo), 1967. Lives and works in Cairo. Moved to the UK in 1979 and the US in 1985. Graduated in film-making from the Tisch School of
the Arts, New York University. She returned to Egypt in 1992, founded the design agency Equinox Graphics and now works full-time as an artist.
“I see my work as dealing with the human condition.”
Archival inkjet prints, from the series Upekkha, 2011. © V&A. Art Fund Collection of Middle Eastern Photography at the V&A and the British Museum. The break,
60 x 60 cm. Sham el Nasseem (Spring), 60 x 80 cm. Armed innocence II, 60 x 90 cm.
28
Afterword
The word ‘siraat’ means path; in the Quran it refers to ‘the
path to God’. In Siraat, by Abdulnasser Gharem, we see a
bridge – a construction that always connects one side to
the other side – but in this case, villagers who thought that
they had found safety from a flash flood ultimately found
a different form of salvation. The image is very powerful.
The photographs by Shadi Ghadirian could almost be
oil paintings from Iran’s past – but the sunglasses and
the modern pose contradict that first reaction. In the
photograph where the woman is wearing sunglasses, we
see the face but not the eyes: a nice paradox.
We particularly liked the ambiguity of the photographs
taken by Nermine Hammam. The Middle East is often
seen as a region of conflict and mutual incomprehension.
Yet everyone lives in an area of great natural beauty and
hospitality. We sense a desire on the part of Hammam to
focus on the many things that people have in common.
Anyone who has been to Morocco will know it is a place
of culture and history. It is tempting to think of the country
as a museum piece. The photograph Saida in Green by
Hassan Hajjaj depicts a traditionally veiled woman. By
using a Louis Vuitton scarf and having the model adopt
a playful pose, with her eyes revealing a smile, a modern
image is created, contradicting the stereotype.
Recent visitors to Beirut will remember the Old
Town, reconstructed from rubble through reference to
old photographs, and may recall the occasional burntout, pockmarked building where the shell has been left
untouched, a reminder of the consequences of civil war.
The photographs by Hadjithomas and Joreige remind us
of the bombing that turned Beirut from the ‘Paris of the
East’ into a war zone and of the power of photography in
capturing what used to exist.
Sheila Conway and Oliver Jamieson
Dubai
Our thanks to Dr Marta Weiss, exhibition curator; Dr Venetia Porter,
curator of Islamic and contemporary Middle Eastern art at the British
Museum; and Dr Stephen Deuchar, Director of the Art Fund. Also to
Sheila Conway and Oliver Jamieson of Norton Rose for their personal
response to the photographs.
29
re: Feature
Once upon a time
in the dacha
The gift
Words and pictures by Alevtina Smirnova
he word dacha, in early medieval Russian, meant ‘a gift given publicly’. In 1992, a six-sotok plot of
land (600 square metres) in a newly established gardeners’ partnership was allotted free of charge to
my mother-in-law as a bonus for her long working life.
‘Free of charge’: these were magic words to us. We didn’t have a car then, so to get to our dacha we sat, or
stood, on a crowded electric train (that took 1 hour and 50 minutes) and then squeezed onto a bus (25 minutes)
and then we walked (10 minutes).
The land was dried-up peat, absolutely poor, and pierced through with marsh plants. But we held out against
all difficulties and – employing a labour force made up of our close relatives – we erected a prefabricated
outbuilding, a backhouse and an outdoor shower cabin. With my younger daughter, who was nine at the
time, I built a wattle fence along the sides of the path toward the house and planted flowers behind it. Curious
neighbours made regular excursions to express their admiration. There was no end to our pride and joy. We had
become dachniks.
After a year or two, we had developed two thirds of the plot. Unfortunately, we had to miss the next dacha
season. The following spring, once again we took the train and the bus and arrived at our dacha. It was gone.
We looked everywhere, in growing astonishment. All we could see was a thicket growing on the plot of land but
there were no structures to be seen behind it – so thick and high it was.
Our wattle fence had become a forest. We gave up our dacha dream and called an estate agent.
When your children have suddenly grown up, you feel as if you are pulled up short – where are the everyday
concerns that you have been dealing with for twenty years? What is there new and no less interesting for you to
set your mind on? This, almost certainly, is why the idea of the dacha reappeared in our life – my husband’s and
mine – in 2006. Now, each Friday and each Sunday evening we patiently sit in traffic jams on our way to our
dacha and back again. This is our escape from the rush and the problems of a big city.
We use our dacha to preserve – and to make use of – the old and the old-fashioned possessions of my family:
my grandmother’s old trunk; a sofa which my father had had made by a local carpenter in 1952 and on which
he regularly took his afternoon nap until his last days in 2006; and a table made from the base of my mother’s
treadle sewing machine and the top of an old school-desk.
Each summer, we go mushroom hunting, not in the woods but on our own land. My husband mows the grass,
grills shashlik and fires up the samovar. We pick the fruit from our three apple trees and tend the crop of
watermelons in the greenhouse. Each winter, we struggle with snowdrifts, brush out the carpets in the snow,
decorate the trees for the New Year. This is what makes a dacha uniquely Russian. Our Russian winter.
30
31
32
:Once upon a time in the dacha
Peter and the dacha
Words and pictures by Irina Tiverovskaya
ussia at the end of the twentieth century was in the process of privatisation. It can be hard for someone
who is not Russian to understand what that meant; in effect, every Russian was supposed to get a title
to some property. It could be an apartment, a piece of land, a shed, a stake in a business or even (for
some) the entire business. The property could be obtained in exchange for some small cash or granted
free of charge. Imagine how this felt for people who had never had the experience of private property.
And now it all came their way.
We got our dacha – just twenty kilometres outside Moscow – for a very modest sum of money. And the place
matched the price. It was one half of a dilapidated single-bedroom silica-brick house, with a verandah, no
amenities, no water, and just one Russian-style wood-burning fireplace. The fireplace in the kitchen, once used
as a stove, had been stopped up and gas cylinders brought in. The floor was (and still is) varnished wood. The
walls were decorated with wallpaper.
Our new summerhouse had belonged to the company where my father and I worked and, as a state-owned
dacha, had been leased out to employees. We refurbished it after a fashion. We laid water pipelines. We dug out
a detritus tank. We changed the brickwork around the fireplace. We even planted flowers outside. But it was
never our intention to use the place extensively.
In 1998 Peter was born, and our plans changed. Our son was three months old when we took him out of
Moscow. He settled into his new suburban routine very well. In fact, he seemed to belong to this place in the sun,
with his pram sitting outside from early morning till late at night, and him peacefully asleep inside it.
At the end of June one night there was a storm. It’s not what you think. Peter came to no harm. But the trees that
had once reached a height of twenty metres were no more, the woodshed was gone and what we were left with
(we saw at once) was a long-term supply of wood for the fire. It took us at least a couple of years to bow-saw and
cut all that wood. Peter was learning to walk by then and he did his best to help. We used the wood to heat the
house in the autumn and to cook shashlik in the summer.
Peter is fourteen now, and we have to call him Pete. He has spent all his summers at the dacha. He learned to
swim in the river and he knows which mushrooms and berries to pick in the woods, where to dig for earthworms
and where to go to catch frogs. He can identify different birds and has become an expert fisherman.
Our dacha has entered the twenty-first century. Last year we added a new room (for Pete) and built a new
verandah and an open porch. It now has a satellite TV system, internet capability and a couple of laptops. It is
regularly filled with teenagers. Outside, there are blackcurrant bushes, plum trees, lilac, an oak tree, some birch
trees and spruce. The lawns are mown and a fence marks out our territory. We grow flowers and some vegetables.
Now Pete wants to stay in the dacha all year round. We are working on that. We just need a gas-fired boiler and a
central heating system. The water pipelines that we laid all those years ago are deep enough to prevent the water
from freezing when the temperature drops. Think of us, in the depth of the Russian winter, in the snow and ice,
skiing, hunting, and at night returning to the warmth of our ‘summerhouse’.
33
2013
Thursday
14 March
2013
London
The
Argus
Sunday
2 June 2013
89km /
56 miles
Sunday
10 March
2013
Cape Town
Thursday
June 6,
2013
Friday,
Saturday
February
22–23, 2013
rg
u
zb
it
ar
m
er
t
ie
P
to
n
ba
r
Du
Cycling is
the new
golf
Cycle the
Icefields
Parkway
t d
es e
rg tim t in
la
e ally en
Th idu ev rld
v g o
di in w
in ycl he
t
c
Norton
Rose
Alumni
Hockey
Comrades
Marathon
Calgary
Looking for something to do?
Life
climb cloud-drenched Mount Roraima in search of Roraima
bush toad and lost world of Precambrian era Santiago Ross,
Caracas. visit Melbourne with wife and one of my daughters,
enjoy some good coffee Nino Di Bartolomeo, Sydney. tie the
knot! Georgina Axon, Hong Kong. first word ‘duck’, now
prepare to teach son second word Neil Poland, London.
Paris in the springtime, with Mary-Anne Andrew Robinson,
Durban. hang out with prog rock band ‘In a Nutshell’ at
recording studio (Texas) Georgy Darasselia, Moscow. go
to New York (take the children) Christine Ezcutari, Paris.
go to wedding celebrations in Nigeria (along with 1000
other guests) Carolann Edwards, London. wait for massive
snowstorm, go skiing in back-country of Le Massif JeanNicolas Prévost, Québec. island hopping in Caribbean. Gino
Bell, Amsterdam. 1) teach baby daughter not to party with
attitude at the all-night milk bar 2) perfect efficient use of
baby ‘nasal aspirator’ 3) following steps 1 and 2 achieve
more than three consecutive hours’ sleep Emma Giddings,
London. produce movie on my father’s life Corrado
Wohlwend, Frankfurt. Winter break, Phuket, Thailand
Lucie Craddock, London. cycle fast across seven mountain
passes in Maratona dles Dolomites bike race, Italy, 30 June
Steve Leitl, Calgary.
To
do
35
re: Life
The tall ship
SETTIN G S A I L IN EN G L A N D
Every sailor has a home and every journey has to start
somewhere. Tideway Sailability is a small charity which
runs dinghy sailing courses at Surrey Docks in London;
around half the participants have a disability. Norton
Rose’s London sailing club has been involved with
Tideway for a while now. Last August, I joined members
of Tideway and the sailing club and other random, wouldbe sailors on board the Jubilee Sailing Trust’s tall ship
Tenacious for a glorious day out, sailing the high seas of
the Solent.
It was a glorious day. An unforgettable day. I climbed the
rigging: me, with my bad knee and my bad back and no
muscles to speak of in my upper body. I did it because I
have read all twenty of Patrick O’Brian’s books recounting
the Aubrey–Maturin adventures at sea in the Napoleonic
Wars – so the sea is in my blood. But really I climbed
the rigging that day because I had been told that the JST
works with crew at all levels of physical ability, so I figured
that if ever there was a time to trust someone when they
said I could do it, today was the day.
Later, over a cup of tea up on deck, I had a long
conversation with Andy Spark, the Ship Operations
Manager of the JST. He told me stories about the people
who sail on their tall ships and the transformative effect it
had on their lives, and about the long sea voyage that Lord
Nelson was about to undertake. I went home feeling pretty
transformed myself and the following week had some
conversations with people in the office which culminated
in Norton Rose getting involved with the Jubilee Sailing
Trust and the launch, in October, of the Norton Rose Sail
the World Challenge.
Now I’m wondering, can I raise the money to fly out
somewhere – Sydney? Singapore? – and set sail again, but
this time for longer, on Lord Nelson? Can I? It’s not just the
money (and there are discounts on offer for Norton Rose);
it’ll take a bit of nerve, a bit of gumption. Can I? Can you,
for that matter?
Nicola Liu is the Editor of Re:
36
:The tall ship
“What lies behind us and what lies before us are
tiny matters compared to what lies within us.”
Ralph Waldo Emerson
S A I L IN G T H E W OR L D
A square-rigged barque, the Lord Nelson, is about to
make history as the first disabled-accessible tall ship to
sail around Cape Horn and make landfall in the southern
hemisphere. In the Norton Rose Sail the World Challenge,
Lord Nelson will cross the Equator four times, visit all
seven continents and explore the Antarctic peninsula
before her return to the port of Southampton in the UK in
September 2014.
She will be crewed by a mix of volunteers (signing on for no
more than two consecutive ocean legs) and a permanent
professional crew of eight. The voyage crew, which will
change from port to port, will include able-bodied and
disabled individuals, some of these former servicemen.
Lord Nelson was built by the Jubilee Sailing Trust, a UK
charity which promotes the integration of people of all
physical abilities through the challenge, and adventure,
of tall ship sailing. Lord Nelson, and her sister ship,
Tenacious, are the only fully accessible tall ships at sea
anywhere in the world.
Specialist equipment includes hoists to lift manual
wheelchairs up the rigging, steering wheels operated by a
pulley system, wheelchair lifts, a talking compass, Braille
signs, vibrator alerts and induction loops, customised
cleaning tools, and 'Unwin' fixing points to secure
wheelchairs in rough weather.
While Lord Nelson sails into the history books, Tenacious
will be running short voyages and daysails in the Baltic
(for the tall ship racing), the Azores, the Mediterranean
and coastal waters off the UK.
FUN D IN G
The JST subsidises the costs on every voyage to make our
tall ship adventures as affordable and inclusive as possible.
We also offer bursary funding and fundraising advice for
people who might struggle to afford the full voyage cost.
Andy Spark is the Ship Operations Manager of the Jubilee
Sailing Trust.
J U B I L EE S A I L IN G TRUST
The Jubilee Sailing Trust was the brainchild of Christopher
Rudd, a British schoolteacher and sailor who wanted to
give the disabled children he taught the same experiences
his able-bodied students had. A chance meeting with Dr
Tony Hicklin, a consultant rheumatologist and specialist
in rehabilitation, cemented the idea.
The JST became a registered charity in 1978, and in 1986,
after two years spent on her design and build, Lord Nelson
made her maiden voyage. She has now taken 24,000
people to sea, 10,000 of these physically disabled, among
them 5,000 wheelchair users.
Work began on the build of Tenacious in 1996 – the
largest wooden tall ship of her kind in the world. Since
her launch in 2000, Tenacious has taken 12,000 people
sailing, 3,000 of these physically disabled, among them
1,000 wheelchair users.
Y o u t h L e ad e r s h i p a t S e a
The Jubilee Sailing Trust’s Youth Leadership at Sea
programme trains young people – aged 16 to 25 – in
team-working and leadership skills and builds their sense
of self-reliance and confidence, as well as giving them a
very special experience.
NORTON ROSE
Norton Rose is working with registered charities to offer
disabled individuals the opportunity to join Lord Nelson’s
voyage. Information about a limited number of daysails
is also available to clients of Norton Rose, along with
opportunities to assist with maintenance and attend
dockside welcoming and farewell parties.
All abilities: all aboard. Norton Rose believes in what the
Jubilee Sailing Trust is doing and is a passionate advocate
of its core message, that we’re all in this together, sailing
as equals.
Jenny Leslie is the point of contact at Norton Rose for the
Norton Rose Sail the World Challenge.
37
re: Life
“Try to make sense of what you see,
and wonder about what makes
the universe exist. Be curious.”
Stephen Hawking
ITINER A R Y
Voyage crew sought for ocean legs
and shorter in-country voyages.
No sailing experience required.
No upper age limit.
jst.org.uk/sail-the-world
Oc e a n l e g s
55 days
Southampton–Rio
Oct–Dec 2012
37 days
Rio–Cape Town
Jan–Feb 2013
47 days
Durban–Kochi
Feb–Apr 2013
28 days
Kochi–Singapore
Apr–May 2013
44 days
Singapore–Fremantle Jun–Jul 2013
60 days
Auckland–UshuaiaDec–Feb 2014
25 days
Ushuaia–Buenos AiresMar–Apr 2014
55 days
Buenos Aires–Recife Apr–Jun 2014
45 days
Recife–Halifax
Jun–Aug 2014
38 days
Halifax–Southampton Aug–Sep 2014
I n - c o u n t r y v o yag e s
Depart
Kochi 18–24 Apr 2013
Singapore 28 May–3 Jun 2013
Fremantle 16 Aug–25 Aug 2013
Fremantle 26 Aug–11 Sep 2013
Melbourne 13 Sep–23 Sep 2013
Hobart 24 Sep–4 Oct 2013
Sydney 8 Oct–26 Oct 2013
Auckland 28 Oct–3 Nov 2013
Auckland 4 Nov–13 Nov 2013
Wellington 14 Nov–20 Nov 2013
Nelson 23 Nov–29 Nov 2013
Nelson 30 Nov–9 Dec 2013
Buenos Aires 9 Apr–15 Apr 2014
Halifax 4 Aug–10 Aug 2014
38
Run the ING
New York City
Marathon for
Team Whizz-Kidz
3 November 2013
whizz-kidz.org.uk
[email protected]
+44 (0)20 7233 9696
Whizz-Kidz provides disabled
children in the UK with wheelchairs
and mobility equipment.
The Movement for NonMobile Children (Whizz-Kidz).
Registered charity No. 802872.
39
re: Life
The guide to the Greek islands
Marie Kelly takes us on a personal tour of three Greek islands.
Marie Kelly comes from Scotland and
has lived in Greece for 15 years. She is a
litigation and dispute resolution partner
with Norton Rose, based in Athens.
Photographs by Vassilis Skopelitis
40
:The guide
Andros, Pilion
and Sifnos: the
i n s i d e t r ack
Don’t let recent media images
coming out of Greece fool you.
The Greek islands show in all their
glory why Greece is still a perfect
place to go on holiday. The climate
and the landscape are spectacular.
W h e r e t o s t ay
Andros
Ea t i n g o u t
W ha t t o d o
The focus of the island of Andros
is the beautiful main town, the
Hora, one hour’s drive from the
port of Gavros. Full of nineteenthcentury mansions, with atmospheric
streets, the town is a cultural hub.
Each summer there are good art
and photography exhibitions –
including a first-rate exhibition in the
Goulandris Museum.
Andros has natural springs (and
its own mineral water bottling
plant). The green villages of Stenies,
Menites and Apoikia are well worth
a visit. There are great walks from
these mountain villages down leafy
footpaths by streams. As you would
expect in Greece, the beaches are also
great. The best is Akla, accessible
only by sea from the port at the Hora.
The beach at Piso Gialia (or Mojito
Bay, as my husband calls it) has a
great beach bar and cool vibe if you
can make it down (and with more
difficulty up) the many steps. Batsi
is a relaxed tourist destination, only
ten minutes from the port. It has an
easily accessible sandy beach and the
village is pretty.
How to get there
Andros is easily accessible from
Athens. From the centre it takes one
hour to drive to the port of Rafina. It
is then a two-hour boat journey to the
port of Gavros. There is a bus service
in Andros but it is better to hire a car
or motorbike.
Mikra Anglia is a lovely hotel in the
Hora if you are feeling flush. In Batsi,
accommodation is plentiful. If you are
going in August, or any weekend in
the summer, book in advance.
In the Hora, the restaurant called
Endohora on the main street is your
best bet. The fish taverna at Gialia
beach is great for an after-swim lunch.
Pilion
W ha t t o d o
Mount Pilion has the perfect
combination of mountain and sea
and is a wonderful destination in
any season. The mountain slopes
are densely wooded and abundant
with fruit and chestnut trees. At the
top there is a ski centre. Villages like
Makrynitsa, Vyzitsa and Tsagarada,
with their traditional wooden
houses, are a joy to explore. There are
fantastic walks – or you can go horse
riding – along the mule paths once
used to ferry goods from the sea to
the mountain villages. The beach of
Milopotamos, below Tsagarada, has
tiny white pebbles that give the sea its
azure colour; the beaches generally,
including Agia Saranda and Mourtias,
are spectacular.
Tsagarada has some great traditional
inns and the lovely hotel, the Lost
Unicorn, exudes old-fashioned charm.
It is worth going there for dinner
beneath the candelabras even if you
don’t stay.
How to get there
Mount Pilion is a four-and-a-halfhour drive from Athens. You can fly to
Volos and hire a car there (the town
of Volos is only 20 minutes from the
mountain).
Ea t i n g o u t
Pilion has little foreign tourism and
the standard of food is consequently
high wherever you go. Hearty
mountain stews, bean dishes and
pies are the speciality. There is a
great fish taverna, Angeliki’s, above
Milopotamos beach.
Sifnos
W ha t t o d o
The main town on the island is
really a number of settlements, each
with their own character. Head to
Apollonia for night life, as it has one
great bar after another. The settlement
of Artemonas has Old World charm
and the relaxed feel of Greece from
another time. There are some good
beaches at Chryssopigi (where you
can also swim off the rocks below the
church) and Platy Gialos. The Kastro,
a medieval walled village at the top of
a mountain, is spectacular.
How to get there
Sifnos is three hours on the flying
dolphin from Piraeus. The cost of
bringing a car is prohibitive – better
to hire a car or a motorbike when you
get there.
There is plentiful accommodation
right on the beach in Platy Gialos or
in Apollonia.
Ea t i n g o u t
Sifnos is well known for its food and
several famous Greek chefs come
from the island. The speciality is
chickpeas. (Yes, I know that does not
sound exciting but don’t let that put
you off.) Revithokeftedes (chickpea
fritters), rarely found outside Sifnos,
are heavenly. There is no shortage of
good tavernas but the first restaurant
over the beach at Chryssopigi should
not be missed.
41
re: Life
The guide to Nigeria
Bayo Odubeko gives five good
reasons to be amazed by Lagos
Water
The word ‘Lagos’ comes from the
Portuguese for lakes. Lagos sits on
a long stretch of coastline on the
Atlantic, so there are lots of lagoons
and beaches and islands; everywhere
you go, you see water. Beach life is an
important part of everyday Lagos life.
It’s a coastal city and a port city.
F i lm
India has Bollywood: Nigeria has
Nollywood. The Nigerian film
industry is the third largest in the
world. The movies come out almost
on a weekly basis; they won’t win any
Oscars or Golden Globes (at least not
yet) but they can be quite compelling,
and addictive, drawing on traditional
themes and beliefs, like witchcraft,
polygamy and social elevation. You’ll
find cinemas in most malls (Ikeja Mall
is state of the art) and you can buy
your Nollywood DVDs at Idumota.
Music
The Nigerian music scene is really
thriving; a number of Nigerian
artists, such as 2face and P-Square,
have already become mainstream
international artists. R&B and hip hop
are very popular. So is highlife music,
and fuji beat. Nigerians go to Fela
Kuti’s home (known as ‘the Shrine’;
and it literally is a shrine to this great
musician and political commentator)
to hang out and eat and listen to
music. Beyoncé, Jay-Z, George Benson
have all recently done sell-out gigs.
Scal e
Nigeria is a vibrant, energetic country
and Lagos is its commercial nerve
centre – and of course former capital
city. It’s the fifth largest city in the
world, one of the UN’s ‘mega cities’,
with about 18 million people.
42
The harassment that you once
typically got around the airport is
gone now and the trip out from the
airport is not distressing. When you’re
in the city, you’ll see how increasingly
affluent it is: the Range Rovers and
four-wheel drives, the Hublot and
Patek Philppe watches, the designer
clothes. It has all the hallmarks of a
petrodollar economy.
Nigeria’s economy is forecast to be
the largest in Africa within the next
ten years, overtaking South Africa.
Flocks of international companies are
heading to Nigeria. British Airways’
most profitable route per passenger is
London–Lagos. The plane is always
full. Leading hotel operators are
tripping over themselves to open
hotels in Nigeria; they have 100 per
cent occupancy rate and charge some
of the highest hotel costs in the world.
Lagos is a big city, with legendary
traffic, so you try to avoid moving
around during the day; people stay
in particular enclaves. There is no
subway system. There is a mass transit
railway project under construction.
Lagos needs the infrastructure that
a mega city requires and there is a
$50 billion investment programme to
provide that.
We don’t do parks or green space. It’s
mostly concreted over. You have to go
to Abuja, the capital, for parks. We’ve
been building Abuja for the past 35
years; it’s well designed, impressive.
All the ministries and regulators are
there: it’s the seat of government.
P e o pl e
Lagos is a sophisticated city, with
many restaurants, clubs and bars. It’s
also an emerging market city, so not
everyone is affluent. But poverty is
not a crime. Hopefully, people are not
distressed by seeing some poverty. It
is a thriving metropolis of people.
Lagos is a Yoruba city but it has
become a real melting pot of different
ethnic groups. Like in any city, there
are some areas where you don’t want
to go on your own. The old colonial
neighbourhood is Ikoyi; the more
affluent people live and work there,
or on Victoria Island. The Lekki
Peninsula is a new development;
fifteen years ago it was swampland:
now it’s a place where a lot of people
want to live.
Lagos is very expensive. To rent a
four-bed apartment in Ikoyi, you’d
have to pay around $100,000 a
year and pay two or three years in
advance. Nigerians are amazingly
resilient, given the challenges they
face every day. To the point of being
fatalistic: it is what it is. There are
people who live three or four hours
away from where they work, get up at
five in the morning to get to work and
get home at ten. Many people walk
to work, and they will walk for miles.
That’s what creates the resilience:
they feel that, one day, they’ll be the
one sitting in the Range Rover with
the air conditioning on, being driven
to work, isolated from what’s going
on out there.
Bayo Odubeko is a corporate partner
with Norton Rose, based in London.
Donate funds to
equip women
with a vital survival
tool: knowledge
womenandchildrenfirst.org.uk/donate
or call +44 (0)207 700 6309
A 21-year-old mother (name unknown)
after giving birth to triplets. The triplets bring her number
of children to five. Sadar Hospital, Faridpur. Bangladesh.
© Sam Strickland
Women and Children First (UK) is dedicated to
reducing the deaths of mothers and babies at and
around the time of birth in poor and marginalised
communities. We offer technical expertise, support
and consultancy to partners in Africa, south Asia and
the UK. Registered in the UK, charity no. 1085096
Women in Norton Rose (WiN) supports
Women and Children First.
re: Life
Feeling good
I won’t dance (don’t ask me)
Belly Dancing
Ballet
Ballroom
I dance to everything and anything
I can.
My daughter Camille dances with
the Royal Ballet. Ballet, classical and
contemporary, is the perfect form of
dance. YouTube will bring you the
best dancers and ballets through a
simple name search.
When I was a teenager, every kid in
town took dancing lessons. For boys,
this was just the easiest way to meet
a girl. I took it a little more seriously.
There were different grades and
every class took you a step forward.
We learned historic dances for each
celebratory ball; I remember dancing
the quadrille and feeling that I was at
the court of Marie Antoinette.
Belly dancing makes you feel
completely fantastic – liberated.
I go with my sister, and we have
learned to move our bodies in ways
we never knew were possible. I was
intimidated at first – I grew up with
Jazz, Tap and Majorettes classes –
so I needed to hear the music a few
times before I started to feel the
rhythm. Once I got into the zone, my
body became very fluid and moved
naturally to the beat. Our instructor
encourages you to make the most of
what you have, so even if what you
have is two left feet like me, you can
learn to move other parts of your
body, your hips, arms, neck, and you
use your hair and other elements to
contribute to the overall effect.
Dancing is for everyone, whatever
your experience. Anywhere you have
space, you can dance.
Diana McLeish, London
danceattic.com
royal-ballet-school.org.uk
roh.org.uk
I fell in love with ballet at the age of
five. Ever since then, it has been my
favourite escape and a perfect way to
express myself. I usually take ballet
lessons six hours a week at l’École
supérieure de ballet du Québec and
Studio Bizz.
Lorraine Berkhoff, Montréal
esbq.ca
studiobizz.com
I started taking ballet classes a year
ago. Everything about me is wrong –
age, size, fitness and musicality (lack
of). Despite this, I love the physical
rigour and mental concentration that
ballet requires.
Laura Shumiloff, London
The secret is that before the law I
was a ballet dancer. I was dragged to
ballet classes as a child and I guess
I enjoyed it. I trained at the Central
School of Ballet (Farringdon, London)
and London Studio Centre before
performing and auditioning around
the UK.
Jonathan Joyce-Hess, Melbourne
44
If you passed a formal test, you were
awarded a dance badge. There are
seven: Bronze, Silver, Gold, Goldstar,
Super-Goldstar 1, Super-Goldstar
2 and Super-Goldstar 3. When I
reached Goldstar, I stopped dancing
and started my studies.
At Bronze level you choose four
dances. These can be closed dances,
such as the Foxtrot, the Quickstep,
the Waltz, the Tango Argentino; or
open dances, such as the Disco Fox,
the Boogie Woogie, the Jive, Rumba,
Cha Cha Cha, Samba or Paso Doble.
As the levels increase, the number of
dances increases and the panel pick
the dances.
I hardly ever dance now (maybe just
once a year). The only opportunities
are the occasional formal ball; these
are expensive and crowded, so you
can barely fit on the very narrow
dance floor. That's no fun! I prefer to
go singing.
Corrado Wohlwend, Frankfurt
:Feeling good
Contemporary
Latin
I was the little girl that never stopped
moving and spent countless hours
training at the dance studio (ever
seen Dance Moms?). Now, I take
contemporary classes to stay fit and
for the feeling of freedom dancing
gives me.
For Venezuelans, dancing is not
something you do: you are born
with it. The basic includes Salsa,
Merengue, Cumbia and Regeton,
although Samba and Flamenco are
also common. I recently added Pole
dance to my list.
I dance. I dance Salsa, Merengue,
Bachata. I do it because it makes me
happy. I love Latin music and the hot
rhythm.
Contemporary dance is an
expressive, lyrical form of dance,
with jazz, ballet and modern
influences. Classes are 60 to 90
minutes and consist of a warm-up,
followed by floor work (jumping
and turning sequences) and then
choreography of a short piece.
Wendy Quintero, Caracas
Joy pole dance academy – Centro Comercial
Plaza Las Américas
I can’t imagine a life without dancing
– it would be a life without joy.
I started with ballet but now dance
competitively in Latin American (so
most of my time goes into training)
but I still do contemporary. Dancing
makes me feel alive – I dance when
I am happy, broken, tired or sad.
I am proud to be representing
South Africa at the 2013 world
championships, in Prague.
Amanda Fortuna, Toronto
citydancecorps.com
I dance Salsa professionally. It is my
life, my passion. I currently dance in
Academy ‘Social Style’ in Venezuela
but I have also danced in the US and
Puerto Rico.
Eric Ramírez, Caracas
facebook.com – Academia Jean Carlos Caballero
Social Style
As a Venezuelan, you dance from the
time you are born, as a toddler in
family parties, folk dances at school,
Salsa and Merengue at high school.
I dance anywhere, just for the fun of it.
Santiago Ross, Caracas
I love to dance, especially Salsa,
Merengue, Bachata. Once a month,
I arrange a Salsa night out and friends
travel all the way from Coventry just
to dance in London for the night and
head back afterwards. My usual haunt
is The Cuban, inside Camden Market.
Val Govender, London
thecuban.co.uk / bar-salsa.com
Sonja Baumeister, Munich
circulo.de / latinosbar.de / max-emanuelbrauerei.de
Tina Costas, Durban
There are three main styles of Salsa:
LA Mambo, Cuban, Colombian.
Colombian is fast-paced footwork;
Cuban is more grounded; and the
style I do, LA Mambo, is a cross-body
style from New York.
When I started I had no coordination
– and now I teach an improver class
one hour a week. In return I get free
classes with one of the best teachers
in the world.
Salsa is the most social dance in
the world. I’ve been to Hamburg and
Amsterdam just for dance. I went to
South Africa and got in touch with
people and they took me out every
night for dance.
Clement Lehembre, London
salsa4fun.co.uk
45
re: Life
The kitchen table
TI M E FOR J I A O Z I
Liu Bingcheng’s jiaozi
For four people, 120–160 dumplings
1: Make the dough
Water, egg, salt, 500 g plain flour
Chinese people tend to make
dumplings – jiaozi – as a communal
activity. It takes a long time and, by
the end, when you clear the table
ready to start your meal (and cold
dishes usually come before the
jiaozi), you are extremely hungry. All
of which creates a great atmosphere.
That is why, particularly in northern
China, people eat jiaozi on the Eve of
the Spring Festival – and on almost
every other special day when they get
together to cook and talk and eat.
There are many different recipes.
Don’t let that put you off. Just start
with this one, provided by Liu
Bingcheng. Or, if you want a simpler
life, go to the supermarket and buy
dumpling skins or frozen jiaozi. Or
put your coat on and go out to a
restaurant. Somewhere in Beijing is a
small restaurant selling 100 types of
jiaozi. If you come across it, you will
eat the best dumplings you have ever
had (apart from the ones your friends
made for you).
46
Mix an egg with salt into a cup of
warm water, gradually add it to the
flour. Using chopsticks, stir until you
get mud balls, then use your hands
to make a smooth, rubbery dough.
Cover and leave the dough on a board
for one hour.
2: Make the filling
200 ml water, 2 tbsp chicken stock or
5 tbsp soy sauce, 400 g minced pork/
lamb, Shaoxing wine or red cooking
wine, 1 bulb garlic, 1 tbsp chopped
ginger, 100 g spring onions, 100 g
Chinese leeks (jiucai). If you have
no Chinese leeks, add 100 g spring
onions and more garlic.
Mix the water with the soy sauce or
chicken stock and add to the meat.
Add a large splash of wine, the
chopped garlic and ginger and finely
chopped spring onions. Stir well. Add
finely chopped Chinese leeks. Make
sure the mixture is not runny. Test for
flavour by cooking a spoonful (in hot
oil or under the grill). Check taste and
add salt if needed.
3: Make the skins
Dough, starch/cornflour + rolling pin
Shake cornflour onto a chopping
board and knead/roll the dough to
make it rubbery (it must not stick).
Cut off a portion (the size of your fist),
roll it into a long sausage shape (2 cm
diameter). Put the rest back in the
bowl and cover it. Lay the rope-like
portion on the board and cut it into
short pieces (2 cm wide). Invite guests
to help by pressing each ‘dough
stone’ into a round, flat, biscuit-like
dough cake. Roll out each dough cake
(keeping it thick in the middle and
thin at the edge to stop the filling from
leaking during cooking). Use cornflour
to keep the rolling pin dry. Do not
make too many at any one time or the
skins will dry out.
4: Make the dumplings
Teaspoons or chopsticks
Put a small amount of filling into the
centre of the skin. (Too much and the
dumpling will collapse later.) Fold
the two sides of the skin together,
pinch the centre, then pinch along
the edge, then pinch harder from the
centre to the side edges, to make sure
the dumpling will not leak. As you
work, put the dumplings on plates
or boards which you have scattered
first with cornflour. Never pile up the
dumplings or put them too close: they
will stick and be difficult to cook.
5: Cook and eat the dumplings
Boil a large pot of water. Carefully put
some of the dumplings in, stirring.
When the water comes to the boil
again, pour in some cold water;
do this three times, at the end of
which the dumplings will float to the
surface: your jiaozi are cooked.
Serve immediately. While everyone is
eating, cook the remaining dumplings
(in the same water).
Serve in a large shallow dish, with,
on the side, Chinese vinegar and soy
sauce (optional chilli, garlic sauce,
sesame oil) in small saucers. (Do not
overdose on the soy sauce.) Eat with
chopsticks.
Liu Bingcheng is from Xinjiang in northern China.
:The kitchen table
SE A B RE A M ( A N D SOU P ) IN J A P A N
Sea bream carpaccio with Japanese persimmon vinaigrette
sauce and lotus root
For six people
Ingredients (sauce)
1 Japanese persimmon (without seeds)
2 tbsp onion (minced)
half a tomato
1 tbsp sherry (or white wine) vinegar
1 tbsp lemon juice
3 tbsp pure olive oil
salt
Instructions
Mince the onion, leave it in water for
a while (or overnight in the fridge),
then drain. Peel the persimmon
and cut it and the tomato into 5 mm
cubes. Put in a bowl, add the onion
and a pinch of salt. Add the other
ingredients and mix.
Ingredients (carpaccio)
20 thin slices of lotus root
10 thin slices of Japanese persimmon
10 lotus root tips
70–80 g sea bream
marinade (15% of the weight of
sea bream): 1 tsp sugar + 3 tsp salt
Japanese persimmon vinaigrette
sauce (moderate amount)
lemon juice (moderate amount)
beansprouts for garnish
Instructions
Slice the persimmon into 10 thin
slices. Slice the lotus root into 20
thin slices, place in water and pat dry
with a paper towel. Deep fry 10 slices
of lotus root in hot oil (130 °C). Cook
remaining 10 slices of lotus root in
salted boiling water for five seconds,
then chill in iced water and pat dry.
Marinate the sea bream and store
for 15 minutes in the fridge. Rinse
well, drain off the water, and slice
thinly. Place the sliced persimmon,
lotus root and sea bream on a dish.
Add a drop of lemon juice to each sea
bream slice. Spoon over the sauce,
arrange lotus root chips and decorate
with beansprouts.
Cabbage soup
Serves 2
Ingredients
5 leaves napa cabbage (Chinese
cabbage)
3 rashers bacon
1 can scallops
2 tsp chicken bouillon powder
1 tsp grated ginger
1 tbsp corn starch
pinch of salt
½ tsp lemon juice
500 ml water
Instructions
Cut the cabbage and bacon into bitesize pieces and simmer in the water
until the cabbage has softened. Add
the chicken bouillon and scallops
(with half the scallop juice). Cook for
five minutes, add the ginger, lemon
juice and salt. To thicken, add the
corn starch mixed with some water,
and it’s done!
Aiko Okada was inspired to cook by her mother and grandmother. She grew up in Ohtsu, attended
university in the US and worked in New York. She is a legal secretary with Norton Rose in Tokyo.
e a t i n g o u t IN
SIN G A P ORE
Men-Tei Japanese Noodles
With a name that means ‘noodle
hut’ in Japanese, this casual
restaurant is exactly that: a tiny
space serving delicious, freshly
made ramen (Japanese yellow
noodles) in a broth. Some gyozas
(fried dumplings) on the side nicely
round up a meal. Men-Tei is in the
central business district, between
the Raffles Place and Tanjong Pagar
metro stops, opposite a bus stop.
men-tei.com / 61 Robinson Road
Old School Delights
Old School Delights takes you back
to a 1980s Singapore classroom.
Blackboards are scribbled over with
drawings and childhood games like
‘kuti-kuti’ occupy you as you select
your food. The menu is an exercise
book and you write your orders
on a hand-held whiteboard with
a marker pen. Don’t miss the mee
siam – rice noodles in a broth made
from a 30-year-old recipe requiring
11 freshly grounded spices. Wash it
down with ice bandung – a pink drink
of rose syrup and evaporated milk.
oldschooldelights.com / 215M Upper Thomson Rd
True Blue Cuisine
True Blue Cuisine is a fine dining
experience that combines amazing
food with a great setting. Peranakan
cuisine blends Chinese ingredients
and wok cooking techniques with
Malay spices. True Blue oozes all
the charm of a classical Peranakan
house. It is narrow and deep inset,
with traditional furnishings, wooden
slatted windows and a deep central
airwell that lets in cool light. Its
location in the museum enclave
is perfect for scholars, artists and
lawyers. The nearby Armenian Church
is the oldest church in Singapore.
truebluecuisine.com / 47–49 Armenian Street
Restaurant critics Selene Tan, Wilson Ang and
Ken-Hui Khoo are lawyers at Norton Rose’s
Singapore office.
47
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THE PLANET
JOIN THE GLOBAL COMMUNITY
MARCH 23 8:30PM EARTHHOUR.ORG
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DARE
THE WORLD
Style
Vintage
inspiration
Maria
In this edition of Re: Style we are
looking at all things vintage!
Here, Maria shows us how to create
an original vintage-inspired look
by mixing old and new. The muted
tones tie the outfit together, with the
fascinator, shoes, gloves and pearls
giving a sophisticated edge, while
the sequins keep the look young and
fresh. This outfit is fun, stylish and
perfect for a girls’ night out.
Now take a look at Re: Style’s vintage
gallery for more inspiration and where
to find beautiful vintage around the
world…
re: Life
Vintage gallery
Beijing
Second-hand clothing is relatively new to China, but has
grown in popularity recently and high quality vintage shops
are flourishing in Beijing. Gulou Dong Dajie and Wudaoying
Hutong are the places to go for vintage shopping. Delia (50
Wudaoying Hutong, Dongcheng District) sources vintage
clothing from Japan, Germany and Hong Kong and also sells
Chinese furniture from the 1960s to the 1980s, Mega Mega
(Gulou Dongdajie, Dongcheng District) has ‘Cool Britannia’
style down to a tee and BrandNu (61 Wudaoying Hutong,
Dongcheng District) is a social enterprise that upcycles
second-hand items.
Shanghai
Brocade Country (616 Julu Lu, Jingan, Shanghai,
200040) stocks beautifully redesigned Chinese Miao
costumes. These intricately embroidered costumes
are infused with the stories of their former owners.
Brocade Country stocks antique collectors’ items,
reworked pieces and smaller items of embroidery.
Hong Kong
Oxfam HK, a charity shop in the basement of Norton Rose’s
very own Jardine House, sells second-hand clothing that tends
to be more designer than high street! For furniture, the newly
opened DeeM (252 Hollywood Road, Sehung Wan) has a really
1970s feel when you step inside, but stocks collectible highend pieces from different decades.
New York
Williamsburg, with its wide range of
shops, is the Mecca for vintage hunters in
New York. Fox and Fawn (570 Manhattan
Avenue, Brooklyn) has a constantly
changing selection of vintage at affordable
prices. For vintage jewellery, Pippin Vintage
(112 W 17th Street) has lots of pieces to
choose from at good prices and there are
drawers full of items priced at $5–$10.
50
:Style
Sydney
London
The best places to look for unique
vintage finds in Sydney are the Bondi
markets and the suburb of Newtown.
Open on Sundays between 10am and
4pm, the Bondi markets (held at Bondi
Beach Public School on Campbell
Parade) are the perfect place to look for
clothing, accessories and antiques. Over
in Newtown Precinct (described as the
centre of Sydney’s vintage scene), an
array of independently owned retailers
offer a wide range of vintage fashions to
suit different tastes and budgets.
If you are in south-west London,
check out The Vintage Event
(thevintageevent.com) at the
Balham Bowls Club (which takes
place once a month), where you
will find traders selling men’s and
women’s clothing and accessories,
and refreshments, including the
Mother’s Ruin pop-up tea and gin
room. Alternatively, pay a visit to
the Hampton Court Emporium
(52–54 Bridge Road, East Molesey)
for beautiful vintage fashions.
Québec
Head to Friperie Lobo Lavida (511, rue
Saint-Jean, Québec) in the boutique
area of Faubourg Saint-Jean for retro
items (old and new). Boutique Lucia
F (418 rue Carron, Québec) combines
vintage clothes and a sewing workshop.
Most items are priced between $10 and
$20, which means guilt-free shopping!
Montréal
Local 23 (23 Bernard Ouest, Montréal), a
friperie and clothing exchange located in
Montréal’s Mile End district, stocks vintage
clothes, shoes and accessories for both men
and women, and updates its stock daily.
Citizen Vintage (5330 Boulevard Saint Laurent,
Montréal) runs a monthly pop-up studio in
Montréal, but also has an Etsy shop if you just
can’t wait (and for those not in Montréal)!
Munich
Macy (Johannisplatz 20, 81667 Munich) is a great
place to buy and sell second-hand and vintage clothes
and accessories. The small corner shop is located in
Haidhausen, one of Munich’s more stylish quarters with
second-hand shops to explore and great pubs and cafes
to refresh you after a long day browsing. On Wiener Platz,
Curtis & Curtis sells vintage-style furniture and interior
decor, including vintage-style reproductions of famous
ships and aeroplanes. There is a workshop round the
corner where Curtis & Curtis will produce made-to-measure
vintage-style furniture based on your own drawings.
Thanks to Maria Urtseva, Hye Sook Cho, Clair Simpson, Catherine Copping,
Lorraine Lee, Lydia Kungsen, Nadia Koshy, Miriam Desmarais, Miriam
Beauchamp and with special thanks to Sharon Thiruchelvam of the British
Council in Beijing. Photographs of Maria by Ivan Maslarov.
51
re: Life
One ﬁne day
A t o p f i v e s e l e c t i o n f r o m C o r r ad o W o hlw e n d —
ch o r al m u s i c t o l i f t t h e h e a r t
1
Missa Pange
lingua
Josquin des Prez (1450–1521)
The Missa Pange lingua is the
last Mass by the Franco-Flemish
composer Josquin des Prez and is
based on the famous Pange lingua
gloriosi by Thomas of Aquin. It
follows the usual Ordinary of the
Mass, is sung in Latin and a cappella.
When I listen to this Catholic Mass
– in a church or any quiet place – I
am always filled with a sense of the
overwhelming power of religious
music and its influence down the
centuries on so many generations.
2
Alexander’s
Feast
Georg Friedrich Händel (1685–1759)
In 1697, the poet John Dryden wrote
an ode to celebrate Saint Cecilia’s Day
(she was the patron saint of music
and patroness of musicians) called
Alexander’s Feast; Or, The Power
Of Music. Händel worked from this
ode when he composed Alexander’s
Feast in 1736. The work shows how
music can exert power over man.
To that extent, the title chosen by
Dryden is somehow misleading. It is
not Alexander the Great who is the
work’s main character but the Greek
musician Thimotheus, who with his
singing moves Alexander and his
beautiful Greek mistress Thaïs to
pride and joy, pity and love, rage and
revenge.
The piece was a great success and
encouraged Händel to make the
transition from writing Italian operas
to English choral works which
eventually led to the oratorio Messiah
in 1742. I particularly like the variety
of moods aroused when listening to
the work: as usual, Händel’s music
vibrates from majestoso to lighthearted, and the soprano arias are
enchanting.
52
3
La passeggiata
Gioacchino Rossini (1792–1868)
La passeggiata is a fantastic little
piece of music, composed in 1831 in
the middle of the Romantic period.
It is all about the cheerful excursion
of two beloveds, struggling with the
weather. If you are in a bad mood,
listen to it and you will smile again.
:One fine day
“I could easily make my Top Five a Top
One Hundred because there is so much
wonderful music. I know a choir here in
Frankfurt that concentrates on music from
English composers only. The selection of
German composers is enormous; and if you
take world choral music, a man’s lifetime
will not be enough to explore it all.”
4
Requiem in
C minor
Luigi Cherubini (1760–1842)
Luigi Cherubini was Italian but
spent most of his life performing and
composing in France. He was highly
esteemed by his peers, including
Beethoven. Cherubini wrote the
Requiem in C minor for King Louis
XVI of France (who was executed
in 1793 in the French Revolution).
The work was premiered in 1816 at
a commemoration service for Louis
XVI. The Requiem’s seven movements
are very different from each other:
beginning slow and mourning, they
rise to a bombastic Dies Irae followed
by an energetic Offertorium before
they calm down again to a longlasting, almost monotone Lux Aeterna
symbolizing eternity. Very impressive!
Beethoven asked to have Cherubini
played at his own funeral.
5
Symphony No. 2
in B flat minor,
op. 52
Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy
(1809–1847)
Felix Mendelssohn is one of the most
popular composers of the Romantic
period. He was greatly influenced
by Bach. His Symphony No. 2 was
written in 1840 to celebrate the
400th anniversary of the invention
of printing. It’s known as ‘the hymn
of praise’ and you can hear that in
every movement. It is very uplifting
listening to the lyrics.
Corrado Wohlwend sings tenor in the
internationally respected Frankfurter Kantorei
and performs with a number of other choirs,
including church choirs and a chamber choir.
He has sung in concert all the works that he
has chosen for his Top Five for Re:.
Dr Wohlwend is a corporate partner in Norton
Rose’s Frankfurt office and a specialist in the
energy sector.
frankfurterkantorei.de
53
re: Life
The poem
Fruit
(for Czeslaw Milosz)
How unattainable life is, it only reveals
its features in memory,
in nonexistence. How unattainable
afternoons, ripe, tumultuous, leaves
bursting with sap; swollen fruit, the rustling
silks of women who pass on the other
side of the street, and the shouts of boys
leaving school. Unattainable. The simplest
apple inscrutable, round.
The crowns of trees shake in warm
currents of air. Unattainably distant mountains.
Intangible rainbows. Huge cliffs of clouds
flowing slowly through the sky. The sumptuous,
unattainable afternoons. My life,
swirling, unattainable, free.
Adam Zagajewski’s ‘Fruit’
“My life, / swirling,
unattainable, free.”
If it were possible to
download lifetime
highlights onto a memory
stick, ‘Fruit’ contains
many of the warm happy
memories I would include.
Images of school summer
holidays, impossible to
re-experience yet clearly
recalled even now, are
re-illuminated and brought
front-of-mind by this poem.
The nostalgia for these
wisps of recollection,
shared by us all, is
beautifully and skilfully
expressed by Adam
Zagajewski. It is difficult
not to be impressed that
exactly the right, evocative,
words have been selected
54
not only by the poet, but also
by the poem’s translators,
succinctly expressing nearuniversal thoughts and
emotions.
Take the word ‘rustling’
(or szelest in the original
Polish). It’s a vivid,
onomatopoeic description
even on its own, but in this
context we are transported
directly to a bright, sunny
roadside, watching and
listening to bustling ladies
as they walk past.
And yet, while the sounds,
smells, tastes and pictures
suggested in the poem
help us rediscover and
revitalise our own individual
memories, we are also
reminded that these
images are gone, no longer
attainable and impossible
to grasp.
At some stage when I get
around to it, I’ll lie down
outside on the grass again,
on a warm summer’s
afternoon, free of life’s
cares and worries, staring
up at the sky and at the
cliffs of clouds flowing
slowly by and listening to
the breeze blowing through
the tree-tops.
I look forward to it and
I know it will be hugely
enjoyable, but it won’t be
quite the same as it was
when I was twelve…
Poetry reporter John Barker is a
senior knowledge lawyer with
Norton Rose in London.
:The poem
Real science
Plasma arc gasification
Through plasmification,
organic matter is converted into synthetic gas, yielding
waste by-products.
Plasma – that mysterious ‘fourth state of matter’ – is in fact
an ionised gas, occurring only at extremely high temperatures.
Gasification is a high temperature process (>700 °C), converting
carbon-based materials into carbon monoxide,
hydrogen and carbon dioxide.
Temperatures in plasma arc gasification range between 1000 and 15,000 Celsius.
The extreme heat vaporises organic materials.
Inorganic materials melt into a molten bath, producing
lava-like chunks of rock when cooled.
Plasma arc gasification can be likened to creating
lightning in a sealed container.
Plasma arc technology was
pioneered in the 1960s by
NASA, which used plasma
torches to test heat shields
on spacecraft. Today, the
power derived through the
process of plasmification
is a potential source of
renewable energy, if the
gasified compounds are
obtained from biomass.
To follow what is going on
in plasma arc gasification,
it is first necessary
to understand what
gasification is not.
Gasification is not
incineration, because
it is not a process of
combustion. Combustion,
or burning, is a sequence
of chemical reaction
between a fuel and an
oxidant producing heat
and the conversion of
chemicals (so, say, wood
to ash). Under gasification,
materials are reacted at
high temperatures without
combustion or burning,
with a controlled amount
of oxygen (or no oxygen)
and/or steam. In the
same example, wood is
converted to a char (like a
charcoal briquette).
Plasma gasification
is a form of advanced
gasification. The process
uses electrical energy
to heat plasma gases to
super-hot temperatures to
melt and decompose solid
materials into molten rock
and gases.
A fuel feedstock,
commonly organic waste
materials, is fed into the
gasifier and an electric
current directed through
a gas stream, creating a
thermal plasma field. A
plasma torch, created and
powered by an electric arc,
ionises gas and catalyses
the organic matter into
a gas and a solid waste
product.
The resulting gas mixture,
called syngas (from
‘synthesis’ or ‘synthetic’
gas), may be burned
directly in gas engines;
used to produce methanol
and hydrogen; burned to
produce steam in a boiler
to power steam turbines
in order to generate
electricity; or converted
via the Fischer–Tropsch
process into synthetic fuel.
Projects to convert solid
municipal waste into
aviation and vehicle fuel
are already under way.
Mark Berry is a chartered engineer, a
member of CIBSE and a partner with
Norton Rose based in London.
55
re: Life
One
hundred
words
Re: asked three writers to come
up with a story in 100 words,
incorporating three given words:
ice, gentle and tea. Here they are.
Now it’s over to you. Send your
story – this time, using the words
earth, spring and paper – to
the Editor, and the best will be
published in the next issue. Titles
are optional and do not affect
the word limit. Your story can
take any form (and arrive in any
language) as long as it is a story.
Write exactly 100 words. Neither
one word more nor one word
less. You have until 1 April 2013.
The Editor
56
:One hundred words
Instinct
A frenzied clatter of claws and the lurcher is half way
across the ice, instinct propelling him to chase some
creature on the far bank of the canal. In my head I hear my
grandmother’s gentle voice warning me against ice and,
like a prophecy come true, the ice cracks and claims him.
The dog’s floundering drags my own instincts flailing to
the surface. I must choose. Now. Whatever I do will leave
an indelible mark.
In the boathouse, nursing a mug of tea, I sit wet, shocked,
exhilarated at the unfamiliarity of life in the raw –
unencumbered by expectation.
Dawn Hayes, London
A gulp of tea. Over the top. There hadn’t been a war for
centuries, since medicine abolished disease and rapacity.
Nobody knows why this war started, but it has abolished
the need to eternally feed and house the millions
reintroduced to death. These aren’t his thoughts. Crossing
the muddied ice toward the enemy trenches he thinks
about personal sacrifice and feels its gentle nobility,
something immortality had denied him and his race. But
as the scything bullets are revealed to be an expression of
the government’s Malthusian anxiety and not a metaphor
for heroic sacrifice, that feeling too is abolished.
David Cross, Sydney
He thought it would never happen to him. No one ever
does. As the front wheels touched the ice and began to
slide, he thought it still. As he skimmed the ditch and
flipped, the motion seemed graceful; a gentle parabola,
like the leap of a ballerina. He almost felt the hushed awe
of the spectators, nestling in the darkness.
When at last he lay still, he stared up at the sky. He gazed
at the stars, that flickered like a thousand tea lights in the
distance. And his only thought was, how lucky he was to
have seen it.
Alexandra Howe, Paris
Illustration by Caroline Janssens
57
re: Life
The person
Elisabeth Eljuri
I
always feel that I’m in my prime. Every time something happens, every year that goes
by, you feel you’re doing something different and exciting.
I was born in Caracas and at the age of three I moved to Europe for six years. Austria,
Switzerland, Spain, then England. After England we went back to Venezuela where I
finished my schooling – up to law school – and then I went to the States. I finished my
Venezuelan law school degree, Harvard Law School, my Venezuelan bar and my New York
bar – and at the age of 22, I was working in San Francisco.
Nineteen years ago and three weeks, exact to the day, I went back to Venezuela after my
three years in the States, and I decided to live in Venezuela. It was a different country at
the time.
My mother and my brother live in Washington, my husband in addition to Venezuelan is
Colombian and American, my children are US citizens and Venezuelans. I’m very proud to
be the only one with just a Venezuelan passport.
I am raising my children in the British school. Classes are all in English, and it’s a very
British education. I’m very lucky to have the opportunity to do that.
My grandfather was a judge and initially an in-house lawyer; more than half of his career
was as an executive director with Chevron. My grandmother was a housewife.
My mother always worked. In the 1970s, she was the only woman officer in the history of
OPEC. She worked really, really hard, and was very successful in her career. I guess I am
replicating that, because I’m also working, and I was – am – very proud of my mother.
58
:The person
It’s a no-brainer that you can work and be a mum and be a
good mum and do everything you want to do. Once you put in
the international travel it becomes more challenging and you
have to have a lot of discipline.
I always fly back on Thursday, or overnight Thursday crack
of dawn Friday. I fix my meetings and everything I do around
that. Friday, Saturday and Sunday are critical because the
kids have a party, because I take them to the club, because
their whole social life depends on mummy inviting friends
over to the swimming pool. I’m the one in charge of their lives,
because when you’re three and six you don’t make your own
plans.
My husband plays golf fanatically, so Saturday and Sunday
it’s his time to enjoy himself and he plays, and that’s
legitimate as well.
Because I live in Venezuela, fortunately, and not in a very
expensive city like London, I have a driver and I have a maid
and I have a nanny and I have people to do the ironing and
the driver goes to the dry cleaner and the maid and the driver
go to the supermarket and at the end of the day, yes, there are
many things I don’t do. Absolutely.
I want my children to be trilingual, so I have a specific plan
how to do that. Right now, it’s English and Spanish that I’m
focused on.
The healthiest, most fun year of my life was
probably my time in San Francisco. Biking
over the Golden Gate Bridge. Playing tennis in
Stanford with friends. Going to Pebble Beach.
It’s not even real how you live there.
Caracas is in a valley, the weather is great,
there’s green everywhere. When I was raised
there, you could bike every day and have fun
and live a normal neighbourhood life. Today,
the security issues make it very challenging.
Barbed wire and gates. Armoured cars. People
generally don’t walk any more, if you have a
choice, evidently.
Good schools teach lawyers to think. Average
schools teach lawyers how to memorise pieces
of law that will be outdated by the time they are
out of law school – in Latin America, schools
are very much in that second category and it’s
hard; it kind of has to be innate. You have to
want to think by yourself.
During the nine months at Harvard I didn’t ever
not enjoy myself or give something up – okay, I
played less tennis, I used to be a tennis player,
I played five hours a day; at Harvard I only
played once a week.
I don’t believe there is anything that’s
unattainable in life.
I don’t deal
with every
person in the
same way
There were 600 people at a conference in Mexico ten years ago and I was the only woman
speaker in two full days. I have 1000 examples like this.
From the very beginning when we started the firm in Caracas, one of the partners, i.e.
myself, was a woman, so everyone we’ve hired over the years – 50 per cent of our lawyers
are women – has never even remotely considered that being a woman is a consideration,
because they see women in leadership, they see women in every position in the firm.
We employ 120 people and they have a stable job and that’s a lot to say in a difficult
country.
I used to work every weekend. I spent 122 days in 2002 in a hotel in Mexico. The intensity
with which I worked in those first fourteen, fifteen years, I could not have done that with
kids.
I now have remote access from home, Blackberry and Skype, three things that absolutely
allow me to put my kids to bed, bathe them, have dinner with them, watch a movie, put
on my PJs, and, when they’re sound asleep, then I’m back on my email.
I do my business development the way that it suits me. I don’t go out to dinner many times
but I do lunches, I speak in conferences, I go to events, I join boards.
59
re: Life
I used to play golf every weekend
when I didn’t have kids. Now I don’t.
But if I go to a round of golf I’ll do my
best to win, I don’t care if it’s a client,
and we have fun and we bet, but I
don’t then order a bottle of Scotch and
stay drinking all night. I’ll finish my
round and I’ll go see my kids, and they
respect it and they understand.
As time goes by, I will be
happy and proud of new
things that today I don’t
even know what they are.
Life isn’t simple but I don’t agonise
over things.
Either you’re honest or you’re not. I am very authentic.
I always say what I think. In my negotiations and in
my dealings with people, people could say whatever
they want but they won’t say that I’m a liar and that is
something that I really stand by, maybe too intensely.
Just two days ago, my flight from the
US to London was delayed, so when I
got to London the person waiting for
me at the gate says, we’ve re-booked
you in three hours because you’re not
going to make this connection, and I
said, I always make my connections
but if you say I’m not going to make it,
then I know we’re really late but let’s
try, and she was willing to play along,
so we did, and we got to the gate and
there were still seven minutes to takeoff, and I didn’t make it because they
gave up my business class seat, so I
didn’t get on; but I got there, and so
the point is, it’s about not giving up.
But, ultimately, I did miss my plane.
So I had two options. I could be bitter
and cry for three hours that I’m not
going to land on time – it completely
spoiled the meeting I had on Monday
morning so it was an issue, it was
very significant – but I just said okay,
fine, then I’ll do something I can do
now, I’m going to do this and this and
that, and then I’m on a later flight so
I’ll catch up with my jet lag, and it
will be better. So I just move on. I’m
pragmatic about it.
I talk to a lot of young people, and I
always say, don’t believe in limitations.
My son was born premature, so we
spent five weeks in the intensive care
unit. That was very stressful, very
painful, but you see him today, he’s
the tallest in his class, super smart.
60
I’m not a populist saying what people want to hear.
I don’t go into every meeting, every committee and
every negotiation with the same style, I don’t deal
with every person in the same way, and it is that,
ultimately, that capacity to come to someone, tell
them something and convince them, that is what
you get paid for.
Friday, two weeks ago, I flew all night, landed 7am,
had slept four hours. I worked all morning, picked
my daughter up at noon, brought her to the office.
She had a great time destroying stuff in my office
while I was working; then I picked up my son when
he was done at 2.30, picked up a friend of his, took
them to the club, played tennis, took them home,
and then, because I’m also a wife, got dressed up,
went to a party and partied until three in the morning
because it was a friend’s birthday. Of course, by the
next day I’m dying. But the point is, I had the energy
to do it.
The day I’m exhausted I’ll have to slow down. And it
can happen. I don’t think I’m invincible.
You have two choices. You take one holiday a year,
disconnect your phone and really make it a holiday.
Or you take a lot more but you’re online and available
and stay on the deal. So I do the latter. We usually go
to our home in the Dominican Republic. The family’s
on holiday, people are in a good mood and, sure, I
work every day, but I find the space in the day where
I can do it and enjoy it.
For work this year I have been numerous times
in Mexico, I’ve been in Costa Rica, three times
:The person
in Colombia, I’ve been twice in Peru, once in Bolivia, once in
Chile, once in Argentina, twice in Brazil, once in Singapore and
Malaysia, four times in Canada, over a dozen times in the US, and
of course I live in Venezuela. I’m sure I’m missing somewhere.
I have 8000 songs or so that a friend downloaded for me because
I don’t have the time to organise an iPod that well but he did, and
so I have that.
Between 17 and 20, I used to read three books a week. I was a
fanatic. Now I get to read maybe one a month, maybe two. The
book I have right now in my bag is the new JK Rowling, The Casual
Vacancy. I’m just starting it, because I had to work on the way
here but I’ll read on the way back.
Everybody who has young kids, you give up going to see a good
movie to go see Madagascar or Ice Age. Lion King is one of my
daughter’s favourites, so I’ve watched it many times. Cars, many
times.
I don’t look tired. People can’t tell I’m tired. I always have energy.
I can do it. I can do it and I’m not struggling.
Lack of sleep. That would be my worst sin.
Venezuelans are very happy people. In the Guinness Book of
Records, Venezuelans won the record for the happiest people.
As time goes by, I will be happy and proud of new things that
today I don’t even know what they are.
Every stage of life has its absolute fulfilments and beauties. I have
never seen people happier than grandparents are.
I think that negative thinking just drains you and pulls you back.
It’s like when you go into the airport and you’re late. You think the
whole way you’re going to miss your flight, it’ll be a miracle if you
make it. If you just focus on, I’m going to make it, and this is how
I’m going to do it, I’m going to deal with my luggage and I’m going
to ask this person to do this for me; and you think all the way how
you’re going to resolve things, you usually resolve them. It works.
Elisabeth Ejuri, Caracas
Career
Norton Rose energy and corporate partner
Global practice leader, Latin America
Head of corporate and oil & gas, Caracas
Management Committee member, Norton Rose Canada
President-Elect, Assoc. of International Petroleum Negotiators
President, Philip C Jessup Foundation, Venezuela
Managing partner, Caracas 2007–2008
LL.M., Harvard Law School, 1992
LL.B., Universidad Católica Andrés Bello, 1991
Born Caracas, Venezuela 1970
Interview by Ingeborg Alexander
Photographs by Ivan Maslarov
61
re: Life
Back streets
p r i va t e v i e w i n g s o f c i t i e s , a n d s t r e e t s , n e a r y o u .
M e lb o u r n e , S u mm e r 2 0 1 2 . P h o t o g r aph by D am i e n B u t l e r .
62
:Back streets
Bourke St, Melbourne
(‘the Paris end’).
Around 9pm.
Damien Butler is
a banking partner
with Norton Rose,
based in Brisbane.
63
re: Life
Coda
Y o u r 2 0 1 3 r e ad i n g l i s t
Andrew James, London
The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay, Michael Chabon, fiction
Michelle Filler, Sydney
Franklin and Eleanor: an extraordinary marriage, Hazel Rowley, biography
Martha Healey, Ottawa
Shake Hands with the Devil, Lieutenant-General Roméo Dallaire, non-fiction
Andrew Riordan, Melbourne
Chronicles: volume one, Bob Dylan, autobiography
Martin Coleman, London
Wolf Hall / Bring Up the Bodies, Hilary Mantel, fiction
Michael Grenfell, London
Summer Lies, Bernhard Schlink, short stories
Heather Irvine, Johannesburg
The Lion Sleeps Tonight, Rian Malan, non-fiction
Jean G Bertrand, Montréal
The Snowman, Jo Nesbo, fiction
Hannah Websper, London
The Lacuna, Barbara Kingsolver, fiction
Miriam Davies, London
A Fine Balance, Rohinton Mistry, fiction
Brixton Beach, Roma Tearne, fiction
The Swimmer, Roma Tearne, fiction
Why be happy when you could be normal, Jeanette Winterson, memoir
The Butterfly Isles, Peter Barkham, non-fiction, natural science
64
Re:
A magazine open to new
perspectives
Issue 4 of Re: was produced
with the aid of the following
individuals within Norton Rose:
Publisher
Laura Shumiloff
Deputy publisher
Susannah Ronn
Magazine editor
Nicola Liu
Art director
Robbie Pattemore
Designers
Michael Dunn
Zeenah Nubheebucus
Picture editor
Ivan Maslarov
Photographers
Damien Butler
Ivan Maslarov
Editorial consultant
Dawn Hayes
Style editor
Madeleine Humphrey
Arts correspondent
Alexandra Howe
Production assistant
Stephanie Hart
Guest writers
Richard Calnan
Sheila Conway
David Cross
Dawn Hayes
Alexandra Howe
Oliver Jamieson
Alevtina Smirnova
Irina Tiverovskaya
Staff writers
Ingeborg Alexander
John Barker, London
Mark Berry, London
Marie Kelly, Athens
Bayo Odubeko, London
Aiko Okada, Tokyo
Supported by
Wilson Ang, Singapore.
Sonja Baumeister, Munich.
Miriam Beauchamp, Montréal.
Lorraine Berkhoff, Montréal.
Peter Burrows, Moscow. Hye
Sook Cho, Munich. Tina
Costas, Durban. Miriam
Desmarais, Québec. Amanda
Fortuna, Toronto. Val
Govender, London. Philipp
Günther , Munich. Jonathan
Joyce-Hess, Melbourne.
Ken-Hui Khoo, Singapore.
Nadia Koshy, Hong Kong.
Lydia Kungsen, Hong Kong.
Clement Lehembre, London.
Diana McLeish, London. Todd
Melchior, Toronto. Wendy
Quintero, Caracas. Santiago
Ross, Caracas. Clair Simpson,
Sydney. Wylie Spicer, Calgary.
Selene Tan, Singapore. Corrado
Wohlwend, Frankfurt.
and
Claire Berwick, London.
Catherine Copping, Hong Kong.
Izabela Duda, Warsaw. Fumie
Hareyama, Tokyo. Lorraine
Lee, Hong Kong. Steven Leitl,
Calgary. Jenny Leslie, London.
Cornelia Marquardt, Munich.
Pierre Nguyen, Montréal. Jane
Park-Weir, London. Teneille
Rennick, Sydney. Nicole
Sigouin, Toronto. Norman
Steinberg, Montréal. Elžbieta
Swiderska, Warsaw. Lisa
Thomas, Johannesburg. Dawn
Whittaker, Toronto. Rachael
Younger, Dubai. Our To Do and
Coda contributors.
Featuring
Lesley Browning, London
Elisabeth Eljuri, Caracas
and Maria Urtseva, London
External contributors
Liu Bingcheng and Vassilis
Skopelitis (photographers)
Clare Ellis and Caroline
Janssens (illustrators)
Andy Spark (JST)
Sharon Thiruchelvam
Dr Marta Weiss (V&A)
Our thanks to individuals at the V&A
(Alice Evans), the British Museum, the
Art Fund, the JST (Robert Peacock) and
to Frau Christa Pfeffer in Munich.
The poem
‘Fruit’ from Without end:
new and selected poems
by Adam Zagajewski,
translated by several
translators. Copyright ©
2002 Adam Zagajewski.
Translation copyright ©
2002 Farrar, Straus and
Giroux, LLC. Reprinted
by permission of Farrar,
Straus and Giroux, LLC
and reproduced courtesy
of Faber & Faber, London
(Selected Poems 2004).
Contact the Editor
re.magazine@
nortonrose.com
Norton
Rose
Norton Rose is a leading
international legal
practice. With more
than 2900 lawyers, we
offer a full business law
service to many of the
world’s pre-eminent
financial institutions and
corporations from offices
in Europe, Asia, Australia,
Canada, Africa, the Middle
East, Latin America and
Central Asia. We are strong
in financial institutions;
energy; infrastructure,
mining and commodities;
transport; technology
and innovation; and
pharmaceuticals and life
sciences.
On 1 June 2013, Norton
Rose will join forces
with leading US law firm
Fulbright & Jaworski L.L.P.
to create Norton Rose
Fulbright. With 3800
lawyers and 54 offices,
including 11 in the US,
Norton Rose Fulbright
will be one of the largest
global legal practices,
with significant depth of
expertise in the world’s
leading business and
financial centres.
Norton Rose is the
business name for
the international legal
practice that comprises
Norton Rose LLP, Norton
Rose Australia, Norton
Rose Canada LLP and
Norton Rose South Africa
(incorporated as Deneys
Reitz Inc) and their
respective affiliates.
No individual who is
a member, partner,
shareholder, director,
employee or consultant of,
in or to any Norton Rose
entity (whether or not such
individual is described
as a ‘partner’) accepts or
assumes responsibility,
or has any liability, to
any person in respect
of this publication. Any
reference to a partner or
director is to a member,
employee or consultant
with equivalent standing
and qualifications of, as
the case may be, Norton
Rose LLP or Norton Rose
Australia or Norton Rose
Canada LLP or Norton Rose
South Africa (incorporated
as Deneys Reitz Inc) or
of one of their respective
affiliates.
Re:
A magazine for
everyone in Norton
Rose and for our
friends, among
them our clients
and our alumni.
Re: is published
twice a year by
Norton Rose and
is available in
print and online at
nortonrose.com/
about us.
© Norton Rose LLP 2013
Issue 4 published January
2013. NR14467.
Printed in the UK
by Pureprint.
£1.00 Not for sale.
Printed on UPM Offset
paper 300 gsm (cover) and
120 gsm (inners).
FINANCIAL INSTITUTIONS – ENERGY – INFRASTRUCTURE, MINING AND COMMODITIES – TRANSPORT – TECHNOLOGY AND INNOVATION – PHARMACEUTICALS AND LIFE SCIENCES
re:
Environmental issues
Tax
re:
Taking a closer look
Corporate finance
Competition and regulatory
Shipping disputes
International trade and commodities
Mergers and acquisitions
Shipping finance
Marine Insurance
Admiralty
Offshore and energy
Infrastructure
Global shipping excellence
Recognised industry leaders
Global Transport Finance 2012
Jane’s Transport Finance 2010, 2011
nortonrose.com/expertise/shipping
Issue 4
2900 lawyers / 42 offices / 6 continents
nortonrose.com
Recording, reframing, resisting
Issue 4
Re:
Work
Maestro Nagano
The photo essay: the Middle East
Tales from Russia
Life

Re: the magazine - Winter 2013

Transcription

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